


But This Song Only Lasts 3 Minutes

by guyi (orphan_account)



Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - High School, Jazz Band AU, LMAO, M/M, also lashton are gonna find their way together somewhere, calum plays the trombone, how do these work, michael plays the tenor sax yooo, ok so like theres muke in this but also not really bc theyre just friends and nothings gonna happen, there might be smut in this i havent decided yet, this is also set in america
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2016-04-24
Packaged: 2018-05-09 03:49:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 31,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5524319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/guyi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Michael Clifford finds peace whenever he's in jazz band. He finds tranquility at the sound of his tenor saxophone and the beginning beat of the drums. Jazz band is Michael's escape from reality, but when Calum Hood shows up on the first day, Michael finds himself becoming increasingly more stressed and even more infatuated with the boy. </p><p>Or, Michael spends more time looking at Calum than looking at his own sheet music, and Calum maybe sort of notices.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi ok so straight up this is a jazz band malum fic that i'm really looking forward to and also when you start reading you'll see i've tried to embody the whole 'mildly unbearable american white boy' act so if you feel an urge to like, punch one of the boys when reading this that's probably why
> 
> also im dedicating this work to [genevieve](http://acciocliffords.tumblr.com) merry christmas happy birthday all that jazz thanks for actually appreciating this fic (she insists it be called ' _you give me a tromboner in my heart_ ' but i didn't want that so)
> 
> title from UGH! by the 1975 lov them

Michael’s thrilled, which is a feeling that he hasn’t felt in a while. He really needn’t be; he knew he was going to make it in, there was no question to it, but he feels thrilled nonetheless, his nerves erased and a smile etched on his face. He stands in front of the list, just looking at it some more as if he needs some verification, like he doesn’t know if he’s made it yet, so he needs to keep reading.

He feels a pat on the back, and turns his head to see Luke Hemmings standing next to him, glancing at the list too. “Nice job, Mike,” the younger boy says to him.

“You too,” Michael says.

The reason Michael and Luke are elated is because the both of them have made it into jazz band, which is Michael’s favorite part about school, honestly. Michael’s Tenor Sax 1, which means he gets all the solos and all the good parts, quite frankly. Luke’s the guitarist, and Michael knows that he’ll do a brilliant job because Luke is a god at guitar, something Michael never managed to learn how to play, no matter how much he’s tried.

“You’re the best fucking sax in this school, man, you knew you were gonna get in,” Luke says, punching the boy lightly in the shoulder as Michael turns to him and smiles.

“And you’re the best fucking guitar in this school, you knew you were gonna make it too,” Michael says back, punching the boy in the same way he did to him.

Luke and Michael both laugh, smiling as they start heading out of the band room, Michael taking a last glimpse at the list just because he wants to. As they do, their nerdy, band-geeky selves pass him, and this is the first time Michael’s ever seen him up close.

He’s sweating from head to toe, the moisture shining off the boy’s beautiful brown skin and forming droplets in his messy, curled hair. He’s still wearing his clothes from what Michael assumes is some sort of sports practice—Michael’s never been the greatest with the whole sports department—and they’re covered in sweat stains. He’s making squeaks on the floor with his sneakers from the damp grass outside and has a duffel bag flung over one shoulder and a towel over the other.

Michael doesn’t catch a very good look at him; Luke’s talking to him about something guitar-related in his ear and it’s distracting him, but he feels a wave of shock come over him when he sees the boy turn into the band room, rather than heading straight for the locker room. It takes Michael by surprise, because he’s only ever seen the boy before in yearbooks and in the cafeteria, hanging with his sporty pals, and he most certainly has never seen him in the band room before.

It sounds bad, but Michael didn’t think his type even knew where the band room was, let alone ever entered it.

“Mike, you alright?” Luke snaps Michael out of his trance as he places a hand on Michael’s shoulder, scaring him a bit.

“What? Oh, yeah, just zoned out a bit,” Michael says, shaking his head as if to wake himself up a bit more.

He turns his head around one last time before they turn the corner, and the boy is leaving the band room and him and Michael only make eye contact for a second, but god, he’s gorgeous and Michael is suddenly insecure for no goddamn reason.

After Michael drops Luke off at home, sneaks a couple of Luke’s mom’s famous homemade peanut butter fudge cookies, and goes back to his place, he locks himself in his room and searches through all his old yearbooks to see if he can find the name that belongs to the sporty boy in the band room.

He checks his yearbook from last year—10th grade—, searching through each face to see if he can recognize it, and eventually he sees the eyes that looked at him that afternoon.

The boy has definitely levelled up since last year, Michael must say. He went from having the same god-awful fringe him and Luke had to a curly gathering of dark hair atop his head, one that really complimented his face. Not to mention, he looks like he’s aged about 3 years from last year to now. The boy’s name is Calum, and Michael goes on to look through the rest of the yearbook to see if there’s anything else on him, other than his name.

There is.

Calum Hood made it onto varsity soccer two years ago, in _freshman year_ , and scored the most goals on the entire team, not to mention the winning one at that year’s state championship.

The jazz band hasn’t even made it past round two in their district championship since 1998.

He seems to be mostly soccer-oriented, appearing in all the pictures of the team. Michael goes to see if he can locate the boy in the photo of the school band, but he’s nowhere to be seen.

He’s so lost, because what would a kid like Calum be doing in the band room? He seems like a nice kid, probably wasn’t out to torture the poor freshman band geeks or rummage through the instruments like years past. And he didn’t even leave the band room with an instrument in his hand either; he left with the same things he entered the room with.

So what the fuck would soccer star and state champion Calum Hood need from the band room?

Michael closes the yearbook, obviously too obsessed with a boy he doesn’t even know, let alone talk to.

Luke texts him.

**from: the lukester [3:21 PM]**

> _Hey u wanna meet up @ the music place? Gotta work on Juilliard auditions dont we?_

**to: the lukester [3:23 PM]**

> _calm ur tits im coming_

Michael gets up from his bed excitedly, causing the yearbook to fall from his bed and land on the floor. He rushes downstairs and grabs his tenor saxophone on the way out, calling to his mother, wherever she is, letting her know he’ll be out at the music store for a while.

She doesn’t answer, and Michael doesn’t expect her to. He goes to the music place so often, the one only a couple blocks down the road, that it’s practically second nature for him to be there. All the employees he knows by name, and he’s pretty sure all the employees know him by name as well. In fact, at this point he should just be working there himself.

Luke’s already there and fooling around with one of the more expensive Fender guitars, plucking the strings and playing random melodies from bits of songs. Michael walks in and the guy at the desk greets him.

“Hey Mike,” he says, waving. He doesn’t need to say anything else, he knows why Michael is there and knows where he wants to go.

“Hey, Jared,” Michael says back, smiling as he heads directly towards Luke. Luke sees him and puts down the guitar, smiling when he sees the tenor sax in Michael’s hands.

“Hey,” Jared pipes up from the front of the store. “If you wanted to, Mike, you could play off of one of the saxes on the wall or something, just use your mouthpiece. I gotta go show the new guy around.”

Jared leaves and Michael immediately rushes to the wall lined with saxophones. He picks out a Cannonball, his favorite brand, pushes his mouthpiece on it and starts playing a scale.

If only he had five thousand dollars, then maybe he could buy it. But he doesn’t, which is the very reason why he wants to get into Juilliard (a scholarship would also be really nice, Michael admits, but you can’t have everything in life and at this point, getting accepted would be enough for him).

Jared emerges from the back room, the one Michael likes to sneak into to get some coffee when no one’s looking, and behind him is a kid that’s vaguely familiar to Michael. He knows he’s seen him before, but he can’t remember where.

“Fellas, this is Ashton,” Jared says to him and Luke, introducing them. “Ashton, this is Mike and Luke, they’re here all the time and no one really cares about what they do.”

Before Michael can say anything about recognizing him from somewhere, Luke pipes up. “I know you!” he says, smiling. “You were in jazz band last year, you played drums.”

 _That’s_ where Michael recognizes him from. Michael didn’t really pay much attention to anyone else besides Luke in jazz band last year, so he doesn’t remember him as much as he probably should. But he does recall the epic drumming from last year, so he assumes Ashton must be a really talented drummer.

“Yeah,” Michael says. “You’re really good.”

Ashton smiles softly at the compliment, some of his curls covering his eyes as he does so. “Thanks. You’re guitar and sax, right?” he asks, pointing to Luke and Michael, respectively.

“Yeah,” the both of them say.

“Did you make it this year? I didn’t notice if your name was on the list or not,” Michael asks curiously. It’d actually be really cool if Ashton did make it, because then him, Luke, and Ashton could all get together at the music store and practice. It’s what him and Luke did before, anyway.

“Yeah, I did,” Ashton says.

“Well,” Jared interrupts, clapping his hands together. “I guess since you three know each other I’ll leave you guys to talk. Ash, come to the back room when you’re ready.”

Jared disappears from their sight soon after, but Luke (with the attention span of a three-month-old puppy) is already wandering off to the little shelf in the corner of the store stacked with vinyls. Michael’s 98% sure that if any vinyls from the music store weren’t there, they were on Luke’s shelf. The boy has a rich family, much wealthier than Michael’s family—even in an alternate universe—and he could practically buy anything he wanted.

“You like them?” Ashton asks, his face lighting up when he sees Luke pick up a _The Killers_ vinyl.

“Yeah, do you?” Luke asks in response, clearly already impressed with the boy and his impeccable music taste.

Ashton laughs, as though it’d be a crime if he _didn’t_ like _The Killers_.

Hopefully, Jared won’t mind if fifteen minutes later, Michael’s blowing into the most expensive tenor saxophone he could grab, Luke’s having loads of fun with one of the Fender guitars he’d like for Christmas, and Ashton’s sitting on a stool meant for a piano, snare drum in front of him and drumsticks in his hand, banging away the skin, instead of working.

**;**

Jazz band starts that day. Michael’s so looking forward to it that he actually finishes all his schoolwork that he has to so he can focus on jazz band, and just jazz band. He meets up with Luke and Ashton outside of Luke’s last class, which is the closest to the band room. They all head down to the band room, greeting the band director, Mr. Feldmann, and setting up their instruments.

Ashton starts to play the theme song for 20th Century Fox, the one that always starts the movies, and one of the trumpet players plays along with him. Pretty soon everyone starts joining in, singing along to the beat of the drum when Michael suddenly stops.

That boy from before, Calum Whatshisface, walks in. He’s not sweaty this time, and he’s not wearing any tight sports clothes. It’s kind of a bummer, Michael thinks at first, because he looked really good when he was sweaty and wearing skin-tight clothing, but he’s still just as beautiful without.

Michael doesn’t even have time to ask why he, of all people, is walking into the band room for the second time that Michael’s noticed because he spots the black case that he’s holding. It’s for a trombone.

Holy shit, Calum Hood, the pride of their school, the soccer legend, plays the fucking trombone. Maybe he’s only carrying it for a friend, but Michael can tell that the look of slight shame and embarrassment proves that he’s the one that plays it.

Michael, rather that speak aloud, texts Luke and Ashton.

**to: jazz band squaddddddd [2:39 PM]**

> _why is calum whatever in here with a trombone case_

**from: the lukester [2:39 PM]**

> _Idfk man_

**from: mashed potato [2:40 PM]**

> _Doesn’t he play?_

**to: jazz band squaddddddd [2:40 PM]**

> _probably, but since when did the city’s favorite soccer player in a century decide ‘hey im gonna start to play the fucking trombone’_

**from: mashed potato [2:40 PM]**

> _Stop it Mike, he’s probably really embarrassed right now_

**from: the lukester [2:41 PM]**

> _Yeah bc he doesnt wanna b seen w us band losers_

**from: mashed potato [2:41 PM]**  

> _We’re not lsoers_

**from: mashed potato [2:41 PM]**

> *losers

**to: jazz band squaddddddd [2:42 PM]**

> _whatever its weird that hes here_

Michael glances up from his phone to look at Luke from across the room, and then to Ashton, who’s sitting at the drum set. They all share an awkward ‘I don’t know’ shrug, like they don’t really know how to react to the fact that soccer prodigy Calum Hood just happens to play the trombone as well.

That’s when Calum assembles his trombone—a Jupiter intermediate (how the _hell_ can Calum afford that?)—and begins playing, and it fucking blows Michael away.

He stumbles into the chair behind him when he hears the boy play, and it seems like everyone else in the room sounds surprised too, because it’s suddenly silent.

It’s only the first note that Michael hears that already tells him Calum’s unbelievably talented at the trombone. Even though he plays brass, which is nothing like the woodwind Michael plays, the first note shows that Calum knows what he’s doing, that he plays with ease and could probably play with his eyes closed and still get everything perfectly right. Michael hears his first note, a B♭ and it sounds like heaven to Michael. He doesn’t even hear the rest of the scale; he’s too busy thinking what Calum’s voice might sound like. There’s no relation between the two—his voice and the sound his trombone makes—but Michael thinks of it anyway and he can’t stop thinking about it.

Calum takes his trombone from his mouth and lowers it when he hears nothing but his trombone, his face turning red as he tries to busy himself so it doesn’t seem awkward, even though the stiffness in the air is already there. Michael’s already whipping out his phone to text the group chat, but Luke beats him to it.

**from: the lukester [2:45 PM]**

> _Holy fuck that kid can play_

**to: jazz band squaddddddd [2:45 PM]**  

> _no fucking shit sherlock oh my god_

**from: mashed potato [2:45 PM]**

> _He’s really talented, wow_

**to: jazz band squaddddddd [2:45 PM]**

> _ngl i kind of have a weird crush on him like i have a crush on his talent_

**from: the lukester [2:46 PM]**

> _Lmao really? He’s kinda cute too_

**from: mashed potato [2:46 PM]**

> _It’s so nice to know you guys aren’t straight because same_

_the lukester changed the group name to ‘the not straight squaddddddd’_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [2:46 PM]**

> _nice were all not heteros this is so wonderful_

**from: the lukester [2:47 PM]**  

> _I hope calum the trombonist isn’t straigjt either_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [2:47 PM]**

> _highkey same hes so cute_

This time, when they all look up at each other, they exchange smirks instead of shrugs.

Calum’s pretty much diagonal from where Michael sits, which is perfect for him, because Feldmann doesn’t really notice how much Michael stares at the boy when they’re not practicing, and Michael can only hope Calum doesn’t either.

Michael already likes the moles on Calum’s left cheek, the little marks in his brown skin that make him unique. And he likes the way this one strand of hair on Calum’s head curls in the opposite direction all the others do. And he likes how Calum’s always tapping his foot to the beat of a song, even if they aren’t playing it.

Basically, Michael practically observes every movement that Calum makes, and he’s being a sneaky piece of shit about it too. Calum hasn’t looked at Michael once throughout the entire jazz band practice so far, and Michael’s thankful.

However, just because Calum hasn’t noticed Michael’s constant gaze doesn’t mean Luke and Ashton haven’t either, and Michael really doesn’t know what’s coming for him when he feels his phone buzz in his pocket.

**from: the lukester [3:39 PM]**

> _Michael and Calum_

**from: the lukester [3:39 PM]**

> _Sitting in a tree_

**from: the lukester [3:39 PM]**

> _K I S S I N G_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:39 PM]**

> _listen shut ur fuck_

**from: mashed potato [3:40 PM]**  

> _You’ve been scoping out the poor boy like he’s a meal, dude_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:40 PM]**  

> _HES CUTE FIGHT ME_

**from: the lukester [3:40 PM]**

> _Yeah but uve been looking @ him like u wanna give him head_

**from: mashed potato [3:40 PM]**

> _Or the other way around_

**from: the lukester [3:41 PM]**

> _TBH Michael just always wants head like thats the truh_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:41 PM]**

> _i do not_

**from: the lukester [3:41 PM]**

> _Yes u do_

**from: mashed potato [3:41 PM]**  

> _Can’t fight the truth_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:41 PM]**

> _i will block u both_

**from: the lukester [3:42 PM]**

> _Do it_

**from: the lukester [3:42 PM]**

> _U WON’T_

**from: the lukester [3:42 PM]**  

> _U WON’T_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:42 PM]**

> _honestly ur so annoying_

**from: mashed potato [3:42 PM]**

> _I’m sitting behind a drumset, Luke’s all the way to the side with a guitar and an amp, and we can still see you checking out Calum_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:43 PM]**

> _stop exposing me this isnt cool_

**from: the lukester [3:43 PM]**

> _No_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:43 PM]**

> _when jazz band is over im gonna punch u both in the face_

**from: mashed potato [3:43 PM]**

> _Just admit you like Calum_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:43 PM]**

> _I TOLD YOU I THOUGHT HE WAS CUTE FUCKING COME AT ME_

**from: the lukester [3:43 PM]**  

> _YEAH BUT U HAVE A CRUSH ON HIM IVE BEEN UR BEST FREIND SINCE ELEM SCHOOL I KNO WHEN U HAVE A CRUSH_

**to: the not straight squaddddddd [3:44 PM]**  

> _LEAVE ME ALONE_

Michael looks up from his phone to see Luke and Ashton about to burst from laughter, their snarky expressions directed towards Michael, and he shoots up the middle finger to the both of them as they start to giggle like five-year-olds. He frowns at both of them before turning around and facing Calum again.

This time, Calum spots Michael looking at him, and so he doesn’t think that Michael’s been staring at him for the past hour, Michael gives him a weak smile to try and ease the tension in the practically nonexistent interaction they’ve had. Calum smiles back, and Michael decides that he should really stop observing Calum. At least, for today.

At the end of jazz band, Michael puts his tenor away and goes to scream at Ashton and Luke for teasing him about his little crush on Calum. He stomps over to the back of the room where the drum kit is, Ashton standing next to it gathering his music. Luke’s not far away, unplugging his guitar from the amp and putting it in his case.

“I fucking hate the both of you,” Michael pouts at them as their faces widen into cheeky smiles.

“We can’t help that you have a schoolboy crush on a _jock_ ,” Luke says tauntingly. Ashton bursts into laughter behind the two of them, clapping his hands together and leaning back.

“I do not have a schoolboy crush, what are you, _five_? And you—,” Michael says, turning to where Ashton’s standing but he finds the boy gone and only catches a glimpse of bouncing honey-colored curls before he can process what’s happening, but it’s certainly not what Michael expected.

Ashton’s run off to go talk to Calum, catching him right before he leaves the band room with the same duffel bag from before, probably to go off and join the rest of his real friends at soccer practice. Michael can’t hear what they’re saying; he’s too far away from their conversation to eavesdrop, but Ashton places his obnoxiously large hand on Calum’s shoulder, and it looks like it intimidates the dark-haired boy, the large hand that belongs to the even larger boy on his small shoulders.

Ashton smiles his charming smile as though he’s trying to flirt with the boy, which doesn’t even make sense, because Michael’s the only one out of the three that’s expressed his attraction to him.

For God’s sake, they don’t even know if he’s gay. He could very well be the straightest person in this school, he could have two girlfriends at the same time for all they know.

Ashton jogs back to where Michael and Luke are.

“What’d you tell him?” Michael immediately asks.

“Did you ask him if he was gay? Wait, hold up, I bet he’s not,” Luke says, facing Michael with his eyebrows raised. Michael flips him off.

“Nah, nothing that could be potentially harmful to any of us. I just told him he’s a good bone player and that if he ever wanted to jam out with us at the music place he could,” Ashton shrugs, and in that instant Michael can finally breathe again, relieved that Ashton didn’t reveal that Michael actually might sort of have a itty bitty crush on the boy.

“Yooo, that’s such a good idea! We can have jam sessions, and you and him can make out in the bathroom when you think no one’s paying any attention,” Luke exclaims, hitting Michael in the chest as Michael frowns again. He regrets telling him that he thinks Calum’s cute; it’s gonna be the only thing Luke talks to him about until he gets over the damn crush.

Michael really appreciates the fact that Ashton offered for him to join in on their little jazz band practices at the music place. He knows that Calum’s probably not gonna accept the offer, just because he doesn’t even know them and probably has lots of stuff going on in his life, most of which involve soccer, but he likes having the thought that he’ll get to talk to Calum more in the back of his mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey there!!!!! feedback would b swell pls come talk 2 me at [my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com) i would really like that


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh look it's the second chapter !! holy shit ok anyway this was supposed to be posted yesterday i just got lazy lmao and this is the first chapter with malum interacting !! yes ok have fun 

Michael realizes why he’s never recognized Calum before.

They don’t share any of the same classes, their paths don’t cross once during the entire school day, and despite being in the same grade, they’ve never really acknowledged each other until now.

Michael walks into the cafeteria with his tray in hand; none of the food placed on it he intends to eat, he’ll probably just throw it away eventually, and he sees Luke waving to him from where they sit with the rest of the jazz band that has lunch that period, but before he does, he spots Calum.

He’s sitting with the rest of his friends from the soccer team—Michael recognizes them from the photo in the yearbook—and some girls that seem equally as sporty and popular as he does. Calum looks like a different person at that table, sitting on it and tossing chips and fries into his friends’ mouths as they do the same to him, laughing and being loud and doing all the thing he probably couldn’t dream of doing at jazz band.

Calum seems so much more comfortable with his friends, his real friends, not Michael or Luke or Ashton, whom he’s only spoken to once. It makes Michael a little sad, knowing he’ll never _really_ be Calum’s friend, no matter how much he wants to be and how hard he tries to be. They might be friends in jazz band but Michael knows that Calum’s never going to want to hang out with him anywhere else, not when the only thing they can talk about _is_ jazz band.

He almost waves to the boy as he passes by their table. Maybe it’s because Michael just wants to be friendly to him, to show that he’s a nice guy too, but Michael knows that he just wants to know if Calum will even acknowledge him when he’s with his other friends. Michael decides against it at the last second though, playing his slightly raised hand off like he’s brushing his hair back. The truth is, Michael already knew that Calum wasn’t going to wave back, and he didn’t want to risk the embarrassment that could come with it.

It also seems a little ridiculous, because they haven’t even spoken, and the most interaction they’ve had is a weak smile shared between the two of them. Calum probably doesn’t even remember know Michael’s name.

He eventually just heads to where Luke, Ashton, and the rest of the band geeks are sitting, worming his way in between Luke and Ashton.

“Um, excuse me? We were having a conversation,” Luke says sassily, turning to Michael and putting his hands on his hips.

“Whoops, didn’t mean to interrupt,” Michael says back sarcastically as he makes an over-exaggerated shrugging motion to add to the effect.

Luke sneers at him, Ashton patting Michael’s back in that ‘bro reassurance’ type of way. Michael smiles at Ashton, with Luke next to Michael pulling out a plastic bag of extra cheesy goldfish.

“Aw, dude, toss me one,” Ashton says when he sees them in Luke’s hand, motioning with his hand for Luke to throw some.

Luke throws one, and it flies right over Michael’s head into Ashton’s open mouth. They both laugh, pleased that Ashton was able to catch it on his tongue, and Luke throws another one.

Michael could be partaking in the game as well, if he wasn’t so distracted by Calum, who is sitting across the _entire_ cafeteria.

He takes the time to acknowledge that Calum’s beautiful. He’s beautiful in his sporty long shorts that hang just over his knee, he’s beautiful with a skin-tight nylon shirt hugging all the right places, and he’s beautiful when he makes any sort of expression on his face. It seems like the stars light up his eyes every time he fucking smiles, and Michael’s never felt more attraction to a human being in his entire life, which is weird, because Calum could be one of the straightest boys in the whole school

“Hello? Earth to Michael?” Ashton says, noticing Michael’s fixed gaze on Calum and waving his hand in front of his face.

“Staring at Calum again? Be careful, he might think you—I don’t know—have a crush on him?” Luke teases, giving a high-five to Ashton as the two of them laugh while Michael turns red.

“If he can see that far,” Ashton adds, recognizing the distance between his table and theirs.

“Nice eyesight you got there, Mike,” Luke comments.

“How can you even see him? I can’t even see five feet in front of me,” Ashton frowns, only realizing now that he hasn’t been wearing his glasses all day, and that he really should because everything past the first couple feet in front of him is blurry. He fishes through his backpack and pulls his glasses out, the pair of them smudged from being jostled up in his back pocket since the school day started.

Michael watches Calum get up from his seat, backpack slung over his shoulder, and leave the cafeteria.

There’s no jazz band that afternoon; they only rehearse Mondays and Wednesdays, which makes Michael a little sad, but him, Luke, and Ashton decide to go to the music store after school anyway, and he guesses that makes up for it.

Michael stops right outside the music store, to tie his shoelace that was coming undone and fiddle around with his tenor sax case—something’s funky, it’s not closing properly—so Luke and Ashton head inside after waiting for Michael for probably only a second or two.

When Michael walks inside, Luke and Ashton are nowhere in his line of sight—they’re probably off in a back room getting set up or something—, but Michael is almost knocked right off his feet and crashes into the glass door when he does look around.

Calum and a girl who seems to be a little taller and a little older than him are in the corner of the music store, the girl sifting through vinyls as Calum stands behind her, whistling some tune and gazing around the store. His backpack is still hanging from his shoulder, making Michael assume he was brought directly here. Another good look at the girl next to him tells Michael that she’s most likely Calum’s sister, probably home from university for the Thanksgiving break. Obviously she wanted to check out some vinyls while she was home, and the fact that Calum’s there, _right there_ , practically knocks the wind out of Michael.

He stumbles into the door and causes Calum and his sister to look up at him. Michael blushes, his cheeks turning to a tinted poppy color and Ashton and Luke to peer their heads out of the back room they’re in, smirks on their faces as they glance to each other and then to Michael, who’s trying his hardest not to sneer at them in front of Calum. Clearly, they knew Calum was already here, and thought it would be _amusing_ if they left Michael to find out on his own. Assholes

Michael pauses for a second after he steadies himself, trying to figure out if he should go up to Calum and start a conversation or rush to the back where Luke and Ashton wait and scream at them or punch them both in the face. How dare they leave Michael to fend for himself in uncharted territory: Calum.

Michael decides that it would probably be healthier and also more advantageous if he talked to Calum, so that’s what he does.

“Hey,” Michael says, smiling lightly.

Calum’s sister appears to be a lot more interested than Calum is, judging by the smile on her face compared to Calum’s expressionless one.

“Hi!” the girl smiles widely back at Michael, waving. “Are you one of Calum’s friends? I must say, I’ve really gotten sick of those rowdy soccer players in our house, I don’t miss them at all!” she laughs, holding onto Calum’s shoulders as he frowns slightly.

“I’m—um, we’re—we’re in jazz band together,” Michael replies, scratching the back of his neck.

“Oh! That’s so cool! I just dragged Calum here ‘cause I just got home today and wanted to check to see if they have any new vinyls. You know, I used to come here all the time; I play the piano and the guitar. It’s so peaceful here, isn’t it?”

Michael nods. He really appreciates the fact that Calum’s sister is doing all the talking; Michael wouldn’t know what else to say otherwise.

“I should really leave you guys to talk. You don’t want an older sister eavesdropping on your boy talk. I’m Mali, by the way,” she holds out her hand and Michael tentatively shakes it, trying to smile and not make this any more awkward.

Mali rushes off to another part of the store—giving Calum a quick kiss on the cheek before she does—, leaving Michael and Calum to chat on their own.

“So, uh, me ‘n Luke ‘n Ash are practicing in the back room, if you wanted to come join us…” Michael says, stuffing both his hands into his pockets and swaying on his toes.

“I don’t have my instrument,” Calum replies.

“You can just use one from the store. Jared doesn’t mind; he cleans them all off at the end of the day anyway,” Michael says, trying to coax Calum into joining them.

“Nah, I have soccer practice in a few, maybe another time?” Calum asks, even though it sounds like he’s just trying to be polite and wouldn’t want to practice with them if he had all the time in the world.

Michael’s hopeful though, and he smiles a genuine smile as he turns to head to the back, where Luke and Ashton are undoubtedly waiting for news on Calum and/or Michael.

“Hey, um, wait—,” Calum says to him. “Do you have your phone? I could give you my number,” he suggests.

Michael tries not to look overly excited, pretending to casually take his phone out of his back pocket and pulling up his contacts as if it’s no big deal, getting Calum’s number.

Calum gets his phone out too, and Michael assumes it’s because he intends on getting Michael’s number as well, and while Michael tries his hardest to play it cool, he’s grinning widely anyway as he says the numbers.

Calum gives him his digits and Michael beams in response, muttering a “Thanks” as Calum gathers his things and calls for his sister, who comes jogging over. As they’re leaving, Michael can hear Mali talking to Calum about him, and while he can’t make out any real sentences, he can tell because Mali keeps glancing up at him.

Michael waves, and Calum waves back.

He runs to the back with his tenor in his hand, and pushes open the door to find Luke and Ashton gossiping to Jared about him.

“Oh, look who’s finally decided to show up,” Luke says, smirking, probably with some clapback on the tip of his tongue.

“Before you start teasing me, I got Calum’s number,” Michael says. He hasn’t stopped smiling since it happened.

“Sweet!” Ashton says, clapping his hands together. “We can add him to the group chat. You don’t think he’ll mind, do you?”

“Dude, no way,” Michael says. “Our chat is literally called the not straight squad with like seven D’s, he can’t be added into that. What if he gets uncomfortable?”

“We can change the name, you know. It’s not like, a permanent thing,” Ashton reminds him.

**from: calum <3 [3:01 PM]**

 

> _Hey nice shirt btw_

Michael doesn’t even know what shirt he’s thrown on, but he looks down to find his beat up Metallica shirt on his body, and, if it’s even possible, he thinks he likes Calum even more.

He doesn’t even notice Luke standing behind him.

“Why do you have a heart emoji next to Calum’s name in your phone?” Luke says. Michael’s face heats up, and he quickly shuts his phone off and shoves it into his pocket as he waits for Luke’s remark that’s destined to come. “Oh man, Ash. This kid’s in deep. You know what, we should be his wingmen, help him out?”

Michael can’t believe the words coming out of Luke’s mouth, but he doesn’t question them. He just kind of hangs his mouth open, until his brain can process what Luke is saying and forms a response. “You wanna help me get Calum?”

“Sure, why not? I mean, if he’s gonna be the only thing you focus on for the rest of the year, may as well make the most of it, right? Besides, I’m sure you’re sick of us taunting you,” Luke says, smiling.

He punches Michael lightly in the shoulder and Michael grins in response, knowing Luke’s completely serious about helping him. Luke nudges Ashton, too, and the auburn-haired boy smiles at them.

 

**;**

 

The biggest obstacle in the way of Michael falling in love with Calum is the fact that the three of them are 100% clueless as to what Calum’s sexuality is, and they’re not just gonna be blunt and ask him, because that’s invasive and rude.

It’s the next day, and also the last jazz band practice before Thanksgiving break, meaning Michael will have four days to play his tenor sax as much as he wants, plus he knows he’s gonna be invited to Luke’s family’s big Thanksgiving dinner, and maybe Ashton might come too.

This leaves Michael one and a half hours to figure out Calum’s sexuality, if possible. It’s probably not going to happen, considering the only time Michael will have to even talk to Calum would be before jazz band starts and when it ends, since they’re sitting a good few feet away when they play.

It’s worth a shot though, Michael just has no idea how he’s going to go about it, because “Hey, I know we’ve talked like once but I wanted to know what your sexuality is” is definitely not the way to go. He might as well be waving a pride flag and shouting, “I really like you!” into a megaphone.

Calum seems to acknowledge Michael a little more now, after their chat in the music store and the text Calum sent that Michael still hasn’t replied to (he almost did, but ultimately panicked and deleted the message, too scared about what it could mean to Calum on the other end. Anything he typed was dumb and seemed planned anyway). But Calum says hello to him when he walks in and grabs his trombone from the closet he keeps it in, which is enough for Michael.

Michael could add Calum into the groupchat he has going with Luke and Ashton, he really could, except he doesn’t want to. Because adding a potentially straight boy into a groupchat literally called the ‘not straight squaddddddd’ is a recipe for disaster, and if not disaster, then definitely awkwardness. Even though both Luke and Ashton agreed to help Michael, there’s no telling what they might say to him if he was added in, so Michael thinks it’s best until Calum’s at least a _little_ more comfortable with the three of them. The last thing Michael wants is to scare the boy. Which he’s probably already done, since Michael’s stumbled or tripped or his legs have given out in some way at least twice, in front of Calum.

"Hey, Mike," he hears his name, and Michael immediately turns around to where Luke and Ashton are sitting, thinking it's them, but they're talking to each other about something, and neither of them are looking at Michael. 

The only other option as to who would've called his name is Calum, but that's completely impossible because Calum's _Calum_ and Michael's, well, just Michael, and there's absolutely nothing extraordinary about him. Other than his uncanny talent for the tenor saxophone. 

Michael looks toward Calum anyway. 

Yeah, it's _definitely_ Calum who was talking to him.

Calum's smiling at him, and even though there's nothing to blush about Michael's blushing anyway. 

"What? Oh, sorry, thought you were Luke or Ash," Michael says, playing off his whole, 'who the fuck is talking to me' thing as though it's nothing. 

"Um, sorry about my sister, yesterday. She really likes meeting my friends, and she didn't stop talking about you the way home."

Michael's heart flutters when Calum says 'friends', like Michael's part of his friend group.

(The friend group that Calum doesn't want any of his relatively _cool_ friends to find out about, but friend group nonetheless.)

"And, she was begging me to invite you over to our house sometime, because she told me that she likes you. You know, like she likes the fact that you're my friend. I mean, you don't have to but you could come over for our Thanksgiving dinner or something, if you want. Yeah," Calum says, trailing off. 

Michael's more than thrilled to have received an invite to Calum's Thanksgiving dinner, but the only problem is is that he's already accepted the invite to Luke's dinner, and it's been an annual tradition since they were 5 for him and his family to come over. So, he lies. Kind of.

“Um, I'll have to ask my parents first, you know how they are,” he says, trying to lightly joke with him.

Calum nods, chuckling slightly. Michael assumes it's because Calum can see right through him, which he probably can. If there's one thing Michael is when he's around Calum, it's transparent.

They don't speak for the rest of the band practice, though Michael finds himself glancing towards Calum when he's not doing anything. And when he's holding a whole note or resting. Or even when he's playing, honestly. He knows the rhythm and notes well enough for him to start looking at Calum while he's playing. It's a little ridiculous, how much time Michael seems to spend gazing at Calum during jazz band, and if Michael wasn't an expert at not getting caught, jazz band would be a nightmare. 

Feldmann ends the practice, and Michael practically jumps up from his seat, running to where Luke is seated with his tenor saxophone still hanging from his neck.

"Let me punch you in the face," Michael says abruptly, causing Luke to look up wildly at the boy in front of him, eyes wide. 

"What the _fuck_?"

"Please," Michael says. 

"W-Why?" Luke asks. 

"Because I need you to hate me," Michael says with a straight face. It almost makes Luke laugh, really, how serious Michael can be when he's just told his closest friend that he needs him to hate him.

"Dude, we've been best friends for like 11 years, I'm not gonna hate you for punching me in the face," Luke says, still a little bewildered as to why Michael is asking Luke's permission to punch him. If Michael really wanted Luke to hate him, he shouldn't have asked and just straight-up decked him. 

"Just let me," Michael pleads, clenching his teeth together.

"Why?" Luke repeats. 

"Calum invited me to his Thanksgiving dinner," Michael explains. 

Luke finally gets it, and nods. " _Oh_ , you need a reason to go because you always come to ours, I get it. I'm still not gonna let you punch me in the face though, that's a little intense."

"What's happening?" Ashton shows up from somewhere behind both Luke and Michael. He's still got his drumsticks in his hand, and his bright smile is a little unnecessary for the current conversation. 

"Michael has a dilemma," Luke declares. "But it's out of my hands."

"Dude, what the fuck? ' _It's out of my hands_ ' my ass," Michael says, imitating Luke. 

"Mike, you and your family have already accepted my family's invitation, if you suddenly say you can't go it won't add up."

Michael groans loudly, and he really doesn't care who hears him at this point. 

"Maybe I could invite him to ours? That way everyone wins, except maybe Calum," Luke suggests, and Michael's entire mood suddenly lightens at the idea. 

Luke takes Michael's sudden smile as a yes, and he punches Michael in the shoulder, grinning. You know, just because.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yikes the ending felt rushed but whatever hey come talk to me on [my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com) pls thanks


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok let's hope i got one more update left in me before school starts rip !! but here!! this chapter _mostly_ focuses on lashton tbh
> 
> this is just for u [genevieve](http://acciocliffords.tumblr.com)!! happy birthday u nerd

It's Thanksgiving break. Michael has been at Luke's house all day. It's about two in the afternoon and Luke and Michael are playing ping pong in Luke's extravagantly furnished basement, another luxury the boy has from his family being so wealthy. Luke has bought the _The Killers_ vinyl he was ogling at at the music store, and it's playing on a vintage record player in the corner of the room as they play.

Luke is kicking Michael's ass like usual, and while it should bug Michael it really doesn't, because Michael's pretty sure that he's won about twice out of every time they've played. Which is a lot of times, considering they've known each other for eleven years, and eight of those have been with access to a ping ping table.

Eventually they have to stop, because a doorbell ring echoes throughout the estate. Michael secretly hopes it's Calum as they both scurry up the marble stairs to the front door, where Ashton stands behind the glass, in awe at the size and display of Luke's house.

"Holy shit, are you sure you live here? This looks like the White House," Ashton gapes. 

Luke blushes, "Yeah, this is my crib."

"Did you just say crib?" Michael asks, mildly repulsed at Luke's choice of words.

As Luke lets Ashton inside, Ashton says, "Not gonna lie, I was expecting a butler or something to open the door and bow at me."

Luke laughs at the thought, "Nah, it's just me, my brothers, and my parents. No servants or anything."

Ashton scoffs like Luke is lying, as he's dragging his hand along the beautiful crystal tables and vases, and to Michael, it looks like he thinks the entire house is exactly like this, all pristine and shiny and white. 

"Oh, if you think this is impressive, you should see Luke's room," Michael chuckles, and Luke jabs him with his shoulder, trying to get him to shut up because it's obvious Luke is enjoying Ashton's gawking at his home.

With that, Ashton immediately stops and turns to face both Luke and Michael with a grin, and before Luke can say anything else, Michael's running up the marble stairs to Luke's room, Ashton following and Luke not far behind him.

Michael opens the door to Luke's room, and when Ashton catches up with him and sees, it's surely not the sight he expected. 

Luke's room, to put it bluntly, is a fucking disaster, unlike the entrance hall that Ashton laid his eyes on. 

"Holy shit," Ashton says again, and Luke's finally appeared behind the two of them, sneering at Michael, who's grinning satisfactorily.

One thing Luke's never really got the hang of is how to put things away, because while he has a closet the size of Michael's bedroom, it's almost always only filled with clothes Luke wears on special occasions, which is not very often, since the boy always seems to be able to get out of going to his father and mother's fancy dinners so he can play guitar and game. There are clothes literally everywhere in Luke's room, strung over desk chairs on clumped on windowsills and lying on his bed and flung on the floor. Luke's shoes seem to be scattered around the whole room, and there isn't a single pair together. 

The only thing that seems to be at least mildly organized are Luke's guitars, which are either hanging on his wall in the corner opposite his bed, or patiently waiting on stands right below his guitar wall, songbooks and picks also in that general area.

And maybe Luke's desk, which is still pretty untidy, but there's nothing but school stuff on it, like textbooks and notebooks and pens and whatnot.

Simply, Luke doesn't know how to clean up. Or maybe he does, but in the eleven years Michael has known him, he doesn't think he's ever seen Luke's room actually neat at all.

"Dude, ever heard of vacuuming?" Ashton remarks.

Michael laughs loudly at Ashton's comment, much to Luke's dismay. He pouts, making his way through the piles of clothes to slump on his bed.

"Hey, at least you have an Xbox in your room," Ashton says, trying to find the upside to Luke's unbelievably messy room. He weaves his way through the clutter and sits next to Luke on his bed, looking around. Regardless of the fact that Luke's room looks like a hurricane took place strictly in that area, under his ceiling, his room has a fucking gorgeous view and the white walls still emulate that clean, fresh look that the walls downstairs have. "Do your parents ever like, tell you to clean up?"

Luke shrugs, "They do, I just never listen."

Ashton laughs.

Michael catches the both of them off guard by chucking Xbox controllers their way. "Who's up for a little Call of Duty: Ghosts?"

 

**;**

 

They spend the rest of the afternoon cooped up in Luke's room, gaming or yelling, or downstairs in the basement, playing more ping pong or screaming or slouching around on their phones, something all teenagers seem to do in Luke's household. Good thing that sound doesn't travel far in the house, because about 70% of the time the three of them have been together they've spent shouting, for some reason.

It's about 5:30 in the evening, and Luke's mother, Liz, is putting the second turkey into the oven to bake. Somehow, the smell of Thanksgiving dinner has travelled throughout the huge mansion, and even a floor below Michael can smell it.

It also sucks, because it's only 5:30 and Michael is very hungry, as are Luke and Ashton, but they don't seem to be displaying their need for food as much as Michael is. Plus, Calum should be there by now. Michael told him that he could come between two and five, and he still hasn't shown up. Maybe he's running late, or he's lost or something. Michael wouldn't blame him if he was lost, Luke's house is in the middle of nowhere and it's also gigantic, so it's probably a little misleading. 

Michael's family and the rest of Luke's are starting to arrive. The boys can hear the chatter that comes from the entrance hall, greetings and welcomes and "Oh my, you've grown"s.

Eventually Ashton manages to coax Luke and Michael to join the family get together, much to Michael and Luke's dismay, mostly Luke. He despises being forced to hang around relatives he sees once a year and suffer through their, "Luke, do you do any sports? You could get some serious scholarships if you tried," and "Luke, how's school? Are you enjoying it?", and his personal favorite, "So tell me, Luke, do you have a special lady in your life right now?"

Michael knows Luke fucking hates it because he's witnessed it first hand, and if there's one expression Michael can easily tell on Luke's face, it's discomfort. Half the reason Michael even comes over is to be there as moral support for Luke, while his relatives pimp and poke at him, all while either ignoring Michael or asking him bland questions that have no point to them.

"Come on, Luke, your family seem fine," Ashton says as Luke is slowly trudging up the stairs.

"That's because you don't live with them."

Luckily for Luke, Ashton's presence seems to take away from Luke, since he's new there and nobody's actually seen him before. 

"Luke!" Luke's aunt exclaims when she sees the curly-headed boy standing between Luke and Michael. "Who's your friend?"

"Oh, um, this is Ashton," Luke stutters, pushing Ashton forward slightly. 

"Nice to meet you, ma'am," Ashton smiles his all-tooth smile and holds out his hand, something neither Luke nor Michael could ever imagine either of them doing. 

Luke's aunt looks pleased with the polite attitude Ashton has, and shakes his hand firmly before winking at Luke, probably suggestively. Ashton moves back to where Luke and Michael are standing.

"Nice job, now _I_ have to be polite and well-mannered around my relatives. Fuck you," Luke frowns at Ashton, who rolls his eyes in response. 

Michael reaches in his pocket to get his phone, but his pockets are empty and phone-less. Michael panics, quickly scanning around the room to see if he can find it, but it's nowhere in sight. _Probably buried in Luke's room_ , he thinks. 

"Dude, you seen my phone?" he asks Luke, who shrugs and makes an I-Don't-Know sound. Michael sighs but isn't able to spend time looking for it, because the Hemmings' Thanksgiving Celebration has officially started. 

One of Luke's younger cousins drags the three boys into the kitchen, where Ashton immediately gapes again. The kitchen is almost all beautiful glass walls aside from where the cabinets and cupboards are hanging along the wall, and the counters are made of the finest granite Ashton's probably ever seen, and it probably cost about as much as Michael's tuition is gonna cost anyway. 

The kitchen isn't even the best part, because the dining room is really the most extravagant. It's elegant and has cream-colored walls and a beautiful wooden table in the center that's God knows how many feet long covered in a silk tablecloth, and candles and decorative autumn wreaths along the walls, and it leaves Ashton speechless. 

Which is enough for Luke to blush and gleam, even though Ashton hasn't even said anything about it yet. 

"Well come on boys, sit, sit," Liz says, nodding her head towards the three empty seats in a row.

They all tentatively take their seats and stare at the plates among plates of food in front of Michael, most of which Michael knows he's not even going to be able to try since there's so much. Michael thinks he'll probably need some of that drink from the Hunger Games, the one that makes you puke so you can keep eating. It's a little barbaric, but with all the food in front of him, Michael supposes it wouldn't hurt.

Luke's dad, Andy, leads the group in saying grace. Michael just bows his head because he only ever says grace when he eats meals with Luke's family, and he looks toward Ashton who clearly has no fucking clue what to do. They make eye contact as everyone else has their eyes closed and heads bowed, and he motions for Ashton to do what he's doing.

Eventually they start eating and serving the food around, and luckily Ashton knows what he's doing and how table manners work. One of the turkeys is closest to Michael, so he takes a couple of the slices before passing it along to Ashton.

Over the years, Michael's discovered that Luke's family's Thanksgiving dinners are typically very predictable, usually the same things happen each year that result in a laugh and possibly a broken plate or two. Luke's probably realized it too, which is another reason why he dreads their annual Thanksgiving hurrah, because nothing different ever fucking happens. 

Luke lives the epitome of a standard wealthy American family life, when Michael thinks about it. His parents both work, they live in an obnoxiously large and decorated house, he has two brothers — both with girlfriends or fiancées — that have gone off to some expensive college, Luke is a guitar-playing high school-attending rock band-obsessed kid that's on his way to college, and they have so many stereotypical relatives Michael's pretty sure he's lost track of the amount at this point.

Really, Michael thinks, the only thing that would make his life any different from that of a white kid in a typical coming-of-age movie is the fact that Luke is gay. Other than that, his life is spot on.

Once everyone's gathered their first serving of food, the conversation ensues. Luke's younger cousins and the other kids are huddled together at the opposite end of the table, and they're blabbing on endlessly about something Michael probably doesn't care much about. Luke's grandparents and great uncles and aunts are talking with their children, the middle-aged adults in the room, probably about politics. But some of the other middle-aged adults are trying to engage Luke, Michael, and Ashton in conversation. And in Michael's opinion, it's some of the driest conversation he's had all year. 

"So, Luke, where'd you meet Ashton?" Luke's aunt from before asks him, stuffing some stuffing into her mouth. 

"Um—," Luke begins not really wanting to answer the question. 

"I work at the music place they go to, and we go to school together," Ashton says for him, motioning to Michael and Luke when he says "they". Luke is thankful (Michael can tell).

"Oh, very fun," his aunt nods. "Are you in band or something too?"

"Drums."

"How about you, Mike? How's school holding up for ya?" Luke's uncle, asks Michael, and it scares Michael a little bit when he uses his nickname, something Michael didn't really expect. Luke's uncle (this one at least) is what Michael likes to call a beer uncle. It's quite funny, actually, because Michael's parents are there, next to Luke's, and they seem to be leaving him to fend for himself, since they seem to be actively engaged in an intense conversation with Luke's parents.

"S'fine," Michael shrugs, deciding that Luke's tactic of giving uninteresting one word answers is probably best. 

Ashton seems to think otherwise, and to the looks of it, it's almost as if _he's_ a middle-aged adult, talking to them like there's no problem or awkward conversation. It's like he's buttering them up.

Luke looks just as confused as Michael does, because not in any circumstance did he imagine Ashton would ever talk to Luke's fucking relatives like they've known each other their whole goddamn life. 

Luke and Michael pick at their plates for the next couple hours, merely bystanders to all the things happening. One thing Michael does pay attention to is the lavish and probably false account one of Luke's second uncles had with his dad, some extravagantly told story about Home Depot or another dad-store. It ends in a chorus of laughter and banging on the table, even _Ashton's_ giggling his cute little giggle, while Michael and Luke look at each other and roll their eyes, clearly clueless. 

It's after midnight when the feast ends, the desert finished and plates empty. There is more than enough space in Luke's huge home for all the relatives, but he has the type of relatives that are totally 100% willing to drive home to wherever they live at 12:36 in the morning. 

Michael and Ashton are sleeping over, though, which is perfectly fine, and even though they could each probably claim a clean room with a king-sized bed and hot towels, they'll be camping out in the basement. 

Luke, Michael, and Ashton gather together near the door as everyone is getting up and saying their goodbyes, kissing each other on the cheeks and giving one-armed hugs as they collect their things and head to the exit. 

Luke goes through repeated goodbyes and hugs and keeps saying "Bye, see you next year," over and over again until the words don't even sound like words to Michael's ears anymore. Michael and Ashton get by with just goodbyes, no hugs and kisses for them. 

Luke's aunt stops as she sees the three of them, and pulls them to the side.

"You know Luke, just because you say he's your friend doesn't mean I don't know. You two make a very cute couple," she says, winking again to Ashton, who, for the first time tonight, is speechless. "See you next year, I hope."

Luke and Ashton appear to have no words left in their bodies, and Michael is trying desperately not to laugh out loud, his hand stifling the noise.

The remainder of the relatives finally go, leaving Michael, Luke and Ashton to go over the whole night, specifically the part where Luke and Ashton were mistaken for boyfriends, something Michael will never let them forget.

Before they do, Michael runs up to Luke's room to see if he can find his phone. Sure enough, it's laying on one of Luke's dressers, almost as if it was waiting for Michael to come back and claim it. And there it is, the one thing Michael knew was coming but dreaded anyway. 

**from: calum <3 [5:47 PM]**

> _Won't be able 2 make it, sorry :-( family things_

_It's okay_ , Michael thinks to himself as he heads downstairs. He can just tell Calum everything on Monday. _Especially_ the boyfriend thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again talk 2 me abt this fic on my [tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com) feedback would be nice thanks


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok i legit was abt 2k words in when archive decided to delete it all so this is a shitty, not like the first and better version of chapter 4 thanks @ archive u fucking suck
> 
> also i go back 2 school on monday so updates r gonna be more sporadic :-( sorry fam

Since the boyfriend thing, Michael's surprised that Luke and Ashton haven't had what Michael so cleverly calls a “bro kiss”. It seems typical of both of them, to be completely honest, to just randomly kiss one day just to see what it's like. They're both into boys anyway, so it wouldn't necessarily end in a no-homo-bro type situation, but Michael just figured that by this point, they would've at least tried it out.

Calum is able to make it to practice at the music store that Saturday, and even though Calum's barely known the three of them for a month, he's in just as much hysterics as Michael was when he's told of Luke's aunt's mistake. Calum's trying to process it all when Michael realizes something.

Calum's reaction to the Luke and Ashton thing proves he's not against gays, since he seemed not to mind the fact that it was Luke and Ashton, two boys. And while this gives practically no insight as whether or not Calum is queer himself, it proves that at the very least, he's a decent fucking human being.

Even so, it gives Michael a little bit of hope, really. That, or maybe he's just desperate for information at this point, and probably willing to do anything to get it. 

Regardless, it's Monday now. There's exactly a month until the first jazz band thing -- a New Year's Eve celebration that Feldmann signed the band up for, and jazz band rehearsal that afternoon. Michael is determined to figure out if Calum would be okay with dating a male. He probably won't do anything about him and Calum, but Michael just needs to know. Soon.

But before Michael can stress about figuring it out, he needs to stress about all of his classes beforehand, most of which he has no idea what he's doing in. Michael, to put it very lightly, has a hard time paying attention in class. Most of it is because the only thing Michael really does pay attention to is anything involving his saxophone, but it's also because his brain has found a new thing to think about rather than focus on school, and that's a beautiful boy who plays soccer and the trombone, both with probably equal skill level. In other words, Michael does a shitty job of keeping his mind on track when all his brain is doing is screaming "CALUM!" into a megaphone.

Michael's math skills are already mediocre at best, his pre-calculus grades can confirm it, but they're really dwindling on the D level now, especially because logarithmic equations have got nothing on Michael listing all the reasons why Calum would look really great dating a guy, specifically Michael. Besides, Michael really doesn't think Juilliard will be paying too much attention as to whether or not Michael remembers how to use a graphing calculator, but he knows that a better grade equals a better chance. 

Thank God Calum isn't in any of Michael's classes, because if he was Michael may as well just be turning in papers with F's already written on them in hard, red ink. 

And _okay_ , maybe Michael regrets picking all the AP courses he did when scheduling was happening in the middle of sophomore year, but at the time all 15-year-old Michael was thinking about how good they would look on college applications, and definitely had no idea that Calum Hood would walk in and fuck up all his plans. The thing is, is that Michael has the ability to pass the AP courses. His teachers have straight-up written on his report cards that he's intelligent and can manage his time wisely, only if he payed a little more attention (okay, a _lot_ more) and actually pushed himself to do the work. Which he doesn't, but he should really start working on that. 

Michael's main priority has always been band, and it always will be band. School somehow comes second place, but maybe that's just because of his situation and his intense intent to get into a _music_ -based school. Of course, Calum's always in the back of his mind.

(Maybe Michael can have _two_ main priorities.)

He's in AP U.S. History, a class that has the potential to be interesting but just _isn't_ , and currently Michael's only thinking about all the deadlines for his music stuff, like when he has to master this jazz band song and when their next performance is after the NYE one and when his Juilliard audition is, that kind of stuff (it's in 10 months and 13 days). There's something on the board about the Monroe Doctrine that Michael is slightly aware of, but he's close to putting up his textbook and falling asleep. No offense to Monroe, but Michael doesn't really care about his doctrine. 

 Michael's eyes are just about to close when he sees the faint outline of a haircut he recognizes instantly. 

"Um, sorry for interrupting Mr. Henry, but Mr. Thompson needs to borrow a couple textbooks, if that's okay," Calum asks, halfway in the room and halfway out of it. 

Mr. Henry nods and heads toward the closet where he keeps the textbooks. Calum's eyes scan the room, looking to see if he can see anyone he knows. Michael pushes down his textbook and tries to seem as nonchalant as he can. 

Calum sees a couple of the popular sporty kids sitting across the room from Michael, and he smiles and nods at them. They nod back and one of them shoots finger guns at the brunette, who returns them. 

_Right_ , Michael remembers. Calum's athletic and well-liked, just like they are. Michael doesn't know why he wasn't expecting them to acknowledge each other. 

It actually catches Michael a little off guard. Calum's spotted Michael in the back left corner, and he waves at him. Michael waves back friendlily, and even though his main focus is Calum smiling at him, he can see out of the corner of his eye the boys Calum nodded to talking amongst each other, probably about Michael. It should bug him, them talking about Michael, it usually does, but Michael isn't phased. It's because Calum waving at Michael when he could have easily ignored him means that Calum doesn't care whether or not people know Michael is his friend, and that means more to Michael than Calum knows. 

Mr. Henry gives Calum three textbooks stacked on top of each other, and the sight of the beautiful boy with his biceps bulging underneath his boring black t-shirt is a _sight_ , for sure. 

Calum leaves the room, thanking the teacher on his way out, and the door closes behind him. 

Michael is more awake now than he thinks he's been in APUSH, ever, and actually starts paying attention. He finishes the homework assigned that period, satisfied with himself that he actually fucking knew what he was doing. 

Maybe all Michael needs for a little inspiration is Calum. 

 

**;**

After APUSH is English 11, Michael's least favorite subject, if he's being honest. He's an absolute shit essay writer, and he's even worse at comprehending the books he reads. But it's okay, because Luke is in that class with him, and right after, is lunch. 

Michael's walking out of the food court with a tray full or items he knows he's not gonna eat. He passes by Calum's table, and sees him feeding cheese-covered popcorn to one of his pals, the two of them laughing as Calum tries to see how many kernels he can fit into his buddy's mouth. 

Michael doesn't want to interrupt but his feelings take over Calum's feelings, and he waves. Calum stops mid-feed and smiles brightly at him, waving to him with a bag of popcorn in his hand. Michael keeps walking. 

Luke and Ashton are giggling over something on Luke's phone, probably a meme or something else that they'll ultimately have to explain to Michael, because he never understands what's so amusing. Luke has a weird sense of humor. 

"Hey," Luke says as Michael sits down. He tosses a clementine Michael's way, knowing that Michael'll eat that instead of the lunch he has. Michael nods thankfully, and takes his eyes to Calum across the way, once more. 

Calum's done feeding that one kid popcorn by the handful. He's looking at his phone now, along with the rest of his lunch table, and him and the kid both seem to be laughing at something. 

"Hey, Luke, who's that kid that Calum's talking to?" Michael nudges Luke's shoulder, who looks up where Michael is motioning. Luke shrugs, emitting some sort of sound that sounds like he's saying "I don't know". Ashton squints through his glasses. 

"Oh, his name is Dylan Wyatt, he's in my stats class," Ashton tells Michael, checking once more and nodding, confirming the identification for Michael. 

Michael makes a mental note to go and look through the yearbook for him when he gets home. 

It's kind of ridiculous, but Michael feels himself heat up when he sees how well him and Calum get along. Sure, they're jocks, and jocks have a tendency to do weird, kinda gay things for no other reason than for their enjoyment, but Michael's jealous anyway. Which makes absolutely 100% zero sense, because Luke and Ashton are the only people that know about Michael's crush on Calum, and Michael's acting like it should be common knowledge, that Calum is _his_. Michael's sure it's nothing, he's seen the jocks do raunchier and closer things than forcefully feed each other popcorn without them dating, he tells himself it's nothing to worry about. In fact, it's dumb that Michael's jealous about a boy that he doesn't even know, that he's over-thinking this whole thing.

He watches some more, just because he's a nosy little piece of shit, and it seems like Calum's about ready to shove kernels into all the boys at his table's mouths. 

Yeah, Michael has no need to be concerned, unless Calum's into like, polyamorous stuff. But he probably isn't. 

"Michael! Look at this," Luke says excitedly, getting Michael out of his weird trance. He turns to Luke's phone as he plays a Vine, one that Michael yet again, doesn't understand. Though, clearly Luke and Ashton do, because they're about in hysterics, laughing loud and hard. Luke has to calm himself down by resting his head on Ashton's shoulder, trying to breathe at a normal rate again. 

Michael thinks back to the thought of them bro-kissing. He can _definitely_ picture it. 

"I don't get it," Michael declares, and Luke rolls his eyes. 

"You never do," Luke pouts. "Don't you think it's funny?"

Michael shakes his head, still clueless. 

"Ugh, you have such a warped sense of humor. You don't laugh at _anything_ ," Luke sighs.

"Are you sure you know how to laugh?" Ashton remarks, raising a single eyebrow. His clapback earns another laugh from Luke. Michael frowns. 

"You dick, I know how to laugh," Michael says, reaching over Luke and pushing Ashton back slightly with his hand. 

Ashton shrugs sarcastically. "Are you sure?"

Michael can't resist the smile growing on his face much longer, and his act is long gone by the time he shoves Ashton again. The three of them laugh together. 

Michael doesn't even so much as glance in Calum's direction for the rest of lunch. 

 

**;**

 

Finally, it's Michael's favorite part of the day. Jazz band. Michael's more pumped than usual after not having practice due to Thanksgiving and everything that coincided with it, especially marching band, and he practically runs to the room. 

Michael needs as much time as he can get when the bell rings. He doesn't know how, but Michael is going to figure out if Calum would ever be up for dating another boy, as like... boyfriends. He will. It's like, his number one priority. Not even saxophone is that high up on his to-do list (ha). 

He's the first person in the band room. Michael gets his tenor out from the closet that stores all the bigger instruments, like trombones and tubas and whatnot. He puts it together but leaves the mouthpiece off, putting the wooden reed into his mouth to get it all moist. 

It's then that Calum walks into the room. His trombone is waiting along the side of the band room, not in the closet where everyone else keeps him. He puts it together (his job is a lot easier, trombones don't have reeds. Michael needs to rant about reeds one of these days, the little bastards) and blows a couple notes, playing a quick scale to warm up. 

Michael jogs over to Calum. 

"Dude, is stuffing popcorn a hobby of yours?" he asks, trying to make small talk. 

Calum looks confused at Michael's words, like he has no clue what the hell Michael is referring to, but then he remembers and chuckles. "Oh, no, just something I do with Dylan. I got some more, I could do it with you, if you'd like?"

"Do you always willingly ask people if they'd like to have a popcorn handful the size of a small squirrel stuffed into their mouth?" Michael asks. 

"No, just with friends, specifically boys that are willing to do it," Calum jokes back. 

"No girls?"

"Girls never want to do it. I'll be damned the day I meet a girl who _wants_ me to shove popcorn into their mouth," Calum says. 

Michael can't stop the words coming out of his mouth. Calum seems to get rid of Michael's filter. "I think they would. You're cute and talented, I don't see why anyone would refuse anything from you."

"You think I'm cute?"

Michael panics a little. "It's common knowledge, everyone thinks you're cute. Even the straightest guy, he'll call you cute and then say 'no homo' so it doesn't ruin his masculinity."

Calum laughs really loudly at that. His eyes scrunch up and his mouth spreads open in a gleeful smile, and he claps as he laughs. Michael doesn't think he's ever seen a laugh as perfect as his. 

"Well, thank you Mikey," Calum says as he holds his neck with his hands. If Michael learned anything from his one semester of psychology last year, it's that that is a clear sign of being embarrassed, or blushing. Calum's probably doing both.

The nickname that Calum's given is one that Michael hadn't been called since elementary school, insisting throughout all of middle school that he was too old to be called Mikey, but when it rolls off Calum's tongue it sounds like heaven. Michael gains a sudden appreciation for the nickname once more, but he's sure it's only because Calum said it, and he's extra sure that if Luke or Ashton had said the name, Michael would've told them to stop making him sound like he's seven. 

Luke and Ashton walk in at that time, and Michael's sure they're about to tell Michael off for not waiting for them when the bell rang, but they see him next to Calum, and Ashton winks. Michael can see out of his peripheral vision that Luke and Ashton are talking about something very avidly, and they seem dedicated in the conversation.

"You are welcome," Michael beams.

Feldmann walks in. He tells everyone to get in their seats and start getting ready, since practice officially begins in five minutes. Michael says a quick goodbye to Calum and rushes back to his sax, putting the reed on the mouthpiece and the mouthpiece on the sax. He throws on his neck strap and connects the entire instrument to it and heads to his seat at the end of the first row. Calum's in the row behind, a couple feet away and diagonal from him. As Michael shuffles through his music to get it in order, he locks eyes with Calum. Calum smiles back at him. 

**from: the lukester [2:37 PM]**

> _;-)_

**to: the lukester [2:37 PM]**  

> _whats the purpose of this_

**from: the lukester [2:37 PM]**

> _U n Calum_

Michael looks up from his phone and turns to face Luke. He's got his phone in his left hand, a pick in his right, a guitar on his lap, and a suggestive look on his face. He physically winks at Michael, and Michael rolls his eyes and turns back around, smiling to himself as he shakes his head. 

Surprisingly enough, Michael doesn't really feel much of an urge to look at Calum throughout rehearsal today. It doesn't mean Michael doesn't stare at all, because he totally does, he just has other things on his mind. He pays a lot of attention to the music, making sure he's got everything down like rhythms and accidentals and dynamics so the piece (it's Whiplash, like the song from the movie with the psychotic conductor) is mastered, at least, from Michael's perspective. 

Michael doesn't even think about Calum and his sexuality at all. 

It's the end of practice, so around 4:00 in the afternoon. Michael is putting away his tenor saxophone and is in the middle of taking off his neck strap when there's a tap on his shoulder. Michael turns to the side and sees Calum's bright brown eyes level with his own, and he's so startled he accidentally catches his neck strap in his hair, and it ends up getting stuck. 

"Dude, you can't just do that to a guy when he's taking off his neck strap," Michael says to him, one arm raised above his head, holding the neck strap in place so it doesn't hang from his hair.

"Sorry, didn't know they were so dangerous," Calum laughs at the sight in front of him. 

"What do you know, you're a brass, aka, an _ass_ ," Michael smirks. "What's up?"

"Mali was really disappointed you couldn't come, she wanted me to tell you," Calum says, kind of out of the blue, but Michael knows what he's referring to anyway. "She keeps telling me I have to make friends with people that don't like kicking soccer balls into windows," Calum jokes. "And that if I want a date to junior prom I should start dating someone now."

"Who do you want to date? Any specifics?" Michael asks, seeming probably too curious than he should, but it's too late now. 

"I'd like them to be human," Calum teases. "No aliens."

"Really? 'Cause I heard that some aliens can be pretty hot," Michael raises an eyebrow and chuckles. Calum rolls his eyes, shoving Michael lightly with his hand. "So, just a human, then? No gender specifics, cause I can hook you up with a really great--"

"Just people, Mikey," Calum giggles. "Just people."

And maybe, in that moment, Michael totally forgets about the neck strap caught in his hair, probably pulling some of it out, and he smiles, kind of to himself, but also to Calum. Calum smiles back and picks up the trombone at his feet, saying goodbye and heading out the door, probably to soccer practice or something. Michael can't help the goddamn grin on his face, like it's permanently etched there. Luke and Ashton are talking in the corner, and Ashton motions to Michael. The two of them both nod happily towards him. 

Maybe Michael has a chance. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again talk 2 me on my [tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com)!! im always up 4 malum discussions


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im back !! anyway here's chapter 5 which took me a really long time to write (rip) and it's kinda boring tbh !! it's a filler until the very end when something finally happens but up until then its just kinda information but whatever !!
> 
> shoutout to [mar](http://archiveofourown.org/users/dumbmichael) for betaing this and overall being my number #1 fan and supporting me through this fic i love u !! very much !! go follow her on tumblr [@officialsadho](http://officialsadho.tumblr.com)

Luke changes Michael's contact to "Calum's bf" when Michael tells him. Michael rolls his eyes immediately after, seeing how Luke even fucking adds some dumb heart emojis at the end of the contact name “just because, you never know”, but it makes Michael fond of Luke anyway and he can’t even resist it at this point. Michael really loves the fact that Luke is so invested in a relationship that 1) isn’t even in action yet and 2) doesn’t involve him.

“The fact that you fucking let him call you Mikey angers me, you know,” Luke is telling him. They're at Michael’s house in his room, and Luke is doing some homework while Michael is on his laptop. “The last time I called you Mikey was in freshmen year, and you almost sliced my head open when I did. And suddenly _Calum_ shows the fuck up and he calls you Mikey and you just melt? Unacceptable.”

Michael rolls his eyes, “You know I don’t like being called it normally, it’s nothing personal.”

“It’s everything personal, Mike, you’re just in love with anything that comes out of that boy’s mouth. We’ve been best friends for like eleven years and suddenly he can do things you’ve screamed at me for doing in less than a month? Rude.”

Michael doesn’t even know how to react to that, because Luke’s said the L-word and Michael is really fucking sure that he doesn’t love anything about Calum, not like that. Not yet.

“Well, _excuse me_ for having a crush on the boy,” Michael protests, sassing Luke. He tries to get the idea of loving Calum out of his mind, at least for now, so he pushes it to the back of his brain. “Would you rather me have a crush on _you_?”

Luke turns his nose up in disgust. “No, ew, gross, man. Best friends who just so happen to both be into boys should not date, it gets weird,” he says.

“Man, you’re the only one here that’s gay,” Michael says in retaliation. “Maybe Ashton’s gay too, but we do know he’s not straight.”

“Ashton’s gay too, he told me a couple days ago,” Luke tells him.

Michael imitates a shocked and betrayed look. “He told _you_ and not me? Unbelievable, aren’t we all in the same group chat, that’s literally entitled the ‘ _not straight squad_ ’ with like seven D’s, probably representing the fact that we all like _dick_?” he says.

Luke shrugs, and Michael knows that behind his expressionless face that he’s trying really hard to not burst into laughter at Michael’s outburst.

“Wait…” Michael pauses, squinting his eyes as though he’s thinking really hard. “Do you _like_ Ashton?”

Luke doesn’t seem to be getting the message that Michael is sending, and he makes that only more obvious when he replies with “Yeah, of course I do. We’re friends, it’d be kind of bad if we didn’t like each other.”

Michael rolls his eyes at his best friend’s obliviousness. It’s so like Luke to never understand the hidden meaning behind straightforward messages and not do it on purpose, he just answers to exactly what you say without thinking if there’s anything else you’re trying to hint at.

“No,” Michael says, sighing, “do you _like_ him? Emphasis on the _like_.”

Michael can see Luke getting the message now at the way his face turns red and the little hairs on his head near the very top stand up a little more, as well as the ones on the hairline at his neck. He shuffles his hands together in an effort to keep them busy and make him look like it’s not a big deal, which only tells Michael it is.

“Um—” Luke begins, and he barely has time to answer when Michael shouts his response and interrupts him, which is a bit rude on Michael’s behalf, but whatever.

“You do! Holy shit! You like Ashton!” Michael exclaims, jumping off of his bed and pushing his laptop to the side with Luke already trying to explain himself and calm Michael down. “Does he know? Have you guys kissed? Was it your aunt, I fucking _bet_ it was your aunt.”

“Mike, Mike, relax, man. I do think I like Ashton, but I’m not infatuated with him like a certain someone infatuated with a jock who plays the trombone,” Luke is saying, putting a hand around Michael’s arm to get the kid to just take a breather.

“Hey, don’t turn this around on me, this is breaking news! Call the motherfucking Action News, Luke Hemmings has a crush!” Michael is screaming more, and he’s only doing it now to embarrass Luke even further, even though they’re in his room and pretty sealed off from any other human being, “Man, this is iconic. It’s gonna go into the history books. You literally haven’t liked anyone since eighth grade, holy shit.”

Luke’s fully tinged now, and his head is resting in the palm of his right hand, no doubt rolling his eyes. Michael feels satisfied at Luke’s reaction because he stops teasing Luke and sits down as though nothing’s happened.

“You’re not gonna tell him, are you?” Luke asks, a little sheepish.

“No I’m not, that’s your job,” Michael says back with just as much confidence as he had thirty seconds ago.

It’s so nice to hear that Luke has a crush. From the looks of it, it’s not developed, Luke doesn’t seem to have any intention on acting on said crush, but it’s exhilarating for Michael anyway, because it’s his best friend, his platonic soulmate that finally has someone else to think about than Michael. It works out even more because it’s Ashton, and Ashton and Luke are perfect for each other.

Michael actually has half a mind to falsely inform Luke that him, Calum, and Ashton will all be practicing at the music store and then just leave Luke and Ashton while him and Calum go off to date or something domestic and cute.

In Michael’s fictitious, ideal world, they would each be in their own couplets and occasionally go on double dates and tease each other about their relationships and kiss and do all that romantic shit in front of each other like real best friends who just so happen to be dating each other should be doing. That’s Michael’s utopia.

What’s unfortunate is that, despite Luke’s generally outgoing nature and the fact that he’ll take any opportunity to spit out a snarky comment, he’s a wimp. Michael knows this, knows that 9 out of ever 10 times, Luke has no idea what he’s doing and is making things up on the spot. Knows that there is no way in hell that Luke could ever muster up the courage to actually ask Ashton out, especially since Ashton’s a senior and he’s a junior. It’s not happening.

Yet.

Which gives Michael all the encouragement he needs, honestly. He knows Luke is trying to downplay the crush, making it seem like it’ll go away in a couple weeks and they’ll just be friends but Michael knows better than that, knows that Luke doesn’t get crushes often and when he does he crushes hard, falls too fast and last time it didn’t work out in his favor. And that’s exactly why Luke has refused to let himself like people like _that_ , because he doesn’t want to be shot down and made a fool of, not again.

This time, though, Michael’s determined to help Luke get it right.

**;**

  
Hopefully Ashton pays no attention to Michael whenever he’s contacting Luke via his phone, because Michael totally changed Luke’s contact to “Ashton’s future bf” just in retaliation for Luke’s dumbass contact name for him. They’re those kind of friends. Luke doesn’t know, so Michael really fucking hopes Ashton doesn’t notice, because that would ruin basically everything.

 _Operation Luke Needs to Fucking Date Ashton Or God Help Us All_ is in full swing in Michael’s book, because it gives him a bit of a distraction from Calum the Trombonist Who’s Practically Michael’s Dream Boy, and also because there’s really nothing more that Michael wants than to see his best friend finally get in a relationship that he’ll be happy in, that won’t drag him down and make him regret it because Ashton wouldn’t do that to Luke. Michael wants Luke to date Ashton just as much as Luke does, because Luke’s been too goddamn lonely ever since eighth grade when it comes to the dating business, staring too longingly at cute couples that walk by and becoming a bit too knowledgeable about sappy rom-coms.

To sum it up, Luke and Ashton need to date, and so do Michael and Calum.

And then the world will start to make sense again.

**;**

Four jazz band rehearsals have passed since Luke told Michael about the whole Ashton thing.

Four jazz rehearsals where Calum calls Michael Mikey without missing a beat, except maybe Michael’s heart does whenever he hears the name come out of Calum’s mouth. Which isn’t good, Michael needs to act cool in front of Calum, especially since he’s fucked up a few times beforehand (tripping on anything that’s in front or behind of him), and now he really wants Calum to like him.

Not that he doesn’t already, but with the newfound information that Calum is pansexual, he needs Calum to _like_ him.

Four jazz rehearsals where Luke and Ashton act like friends, and even though Michael’s back is usually to them throughout most of the rehearsals, whenever he’s not playing or not gazing towards Calum, he’s looking at Luke and sees him mouthing words to Ashton and watching them laugh as they communicate without actual words and Michael knows that Luke is in deep, just like him.

If one day, jazz band would end and one of them would just spontaneously kiss the other one as they were disassembling their instrument, Michael would probably clap and maybe shed a tear.

Maybe.

Michael does this thing where he imagines things happening as if they actually are, and right now, as he’s walking to APUSH—kind of wishing he was at home but also not because APUSH is his best class nowadays—he’s imagining Luke and Ashton kissing. For real.

It would be so easy if they just kissed without words, with all the feelings shown in the kiss instead of said because everything is easier done than said when it comes to this kind of stuff. But Michael’s seem too many crappy teen movies to know that Luke is too scared to screw shit up if he just randomly kissed Ashton, too panicked that Ashton’ll turn him down or suddenly be like “I’m straight” or some other nightmare.

Also, Ashton’s oblivious. Probably. Maybe. Whatever, Ashton most likely has no idea Luke is hardcore crushing on him, and it’s a shame Luke wants to keep it this way. Bottle up all his feelings because one day the cap will pop off and Luke will explode, Michael can guarantee it.

At this point, Calum’s kind of like a rash in Michael’s mind. Persistent, always there, lingering because he won’t go away, he’s always there and Michael’s been overtaken by him. It’s a shit comparison, but it’s what Michael is feeling.

Calum’s just too perfect. Michael never thought perfection was even real until Calum walked into the band room that one day with a trombone case in his hand, and now all he can do is count the ways that Calum is definitely, completely, 100% out of Michael’s league. There are too many good things about Calum and no bad ones, no ways Michael can convince himself that Calum has flaws because the boy doesn’t. Even the things that used to disgust Michael, make him cringe and groan, are suddenly Michael’s favorite things when Calum does them.

Long story short, Michael is ridiculously fucked if him and Calum end not being a thing, or even worse, end up being a thing and then not working out (and subsequently ruining Michael’s entire life).

The fact that four jazz band rehearsals have passed means that they only have four more to go until their first thing at the New Year’s Eve celebration. Michael texts Luke, Ash, and Calum and asks them if they can meet up at the music store for the practice. Part of why he does is because they all need to practice together since it’ll be beneficial to the band as a whole, as the best players in each of their sections, but also because Michael’s gonna see if he can sneak some time alone with Calum.

And maybe Michael also wants to “accidentally” make Luke and Ashton awkwardly talk about their feelings because they’ll have no other choice. 

Michael totally intends to lock them in a closet for a few minutes.

All of them can make it and within thirty minutes of school ending (after Michael aced his APUSH pop quiz, God bless), they’re all there, instruments out and music on some stands that haven’t been bought yet, ready to play.

Calum looks sweaty, which is perfectly fine for Michael but still seems a little bit off, because if Calum had just come here after school he wouldn’t have been able to make it to soccer practice.

Instead of Michael casually bringing up the topic like a normal human being, he pretends to brush past Calum’s chest with his own -- holy shit, this kid has abs too -- and turns to him with a probably fake-looking confused expression. 

“Dude, why are you all wet?”

Michael made sure that he brushed against the sweat stain around the shirt’s neck. Just because.

“Ran here,” Calum replies shortly, blowing an F into his trombone before continuing his sentence, “had to talk to a teacher to makeup a quiz and tell Coach I couldn’t make it.”

“You ran here? That’s like three miles,” Ashton says, shocked.

“Hence the sweatiness,” Calum says. “For a senior, you really don’t know how to put two and two together.”

Luke roars when Calum says that, bending over his guitar as he claps, his body filled with laughter. Ashton pouts towards Calum before marching over and ruffling Luke’s hair, something Luke hates. A hand flies to Luke’s hair immediately after, trying to fix the quiff that Ashton has laid a hand on.

“No, keep it like that,” Ashton says. “I liked it.”

Michael almost pukes when Luke re-ruffles his hair, just because Ashton said he liked it, but what really makes him almost throw up is the fact that Ashton seems dissatisfied with Luke’s job, so he goes over and does it right.

He swears to God, if they aren’t dating by the end of the year, Michael will think the Earth has gone off course. They’re too damn fond of each other.

Calum sneaks up behind Michael as the whole thing is happening, trombone in his hand. “Are they dating?”

“Not yet,” Michael mutters back, trying to keep himself as quiet as possible so he doesn’t ruin anything.

“They look like they’re dating,” Calum comments.

“I know, _gay boys_ ,” Michael teases, rolling his eyes dramatically.

“Are you… not gay?” Calum asks, curious. Michael remembers that Calum doesn’t know Michael has the biggest fucking crush on him.

“Bi,” Michael says as if it’s the easiest thing in the world to say. Which it is, especially since he’s talking to Calum and Michael’s started to feel a lot more relaxed whenever he’s around Calum, like they just belong together.

To be fair, Michael thinks they do.

Luke and Ashton are done fiddling around and possibly flirting, and Ashton claps his hands together and declares, “Let’s get started!”

If Michael were Tenor Sax 2, he’d have more of the same rhythms that Calum would have as a Trombone 1, but he’s not, so they can’t really work on anything together. Luke and Ashton are both in rhythm, meaning that they do have some of the same patterns, so if they broke off it would be perfectly fine.

Michael and Calum are sitting on unopened amp boxes.

“What do you have in measure 85?” Michael asks Calum as they start working on Whiplash, Michael’s favorite song out of the bunch.

Michael leans back to see Calum's music and picks out measure 85, which is basically the super fast part with hard counting because there are seven beats per measure rather than the typical four.

Calum shows him the music, and because Michael doesn’t know shit about bass clef (even though he really should, since he plans on going to Juilliard), he decides to get Calum on his own so they can work on it together, the woodwind and brass duo.

“Hey, lovebirds,” Michael calls to Luke and Ashton. Ashton’s currently sat next to Luke on the piano stool Luke is sitting on with his guitar in both of their laps. Luke’s showing him the notes for the piece. They both look a little surprised when Michael calls them lovebirds. “We’re gonna work in the back room, try to figure this damn counting out.” He motions to the back hallway.

Ashton and Luke both nod, and as Calum and Michael are heading to the back room, he overhears Luke telling Ashton about the solo he wants to take in this song, which excites Ashton.

Once they’re in the small practice room, Michael feels a sudden tension in the air. It’s like Luke and Ashton were his filter, they kept all the stiffness within his mind and out of the air, where Michael suddenly doesn’t know what to say when he’s finally gotten Calum alone.

“85?” Calum asks, breaking the silence. He’s standing behind the crappiest of the two stands in the room.

“How about 77?” Michael says, trying to the keep the conversation music-only. It’s proving to be a bit easier than he thought it would be. “Wait, where’s your pickup?”

He stands up to go next to Calum and read his music. This is the closest they’ve ever been together, as Calum shows him his music in the space. Michael knows he’s breathing all over Calum’s neck as he scans through the page. He hopes it’s giving Calum as many goosebumps as it’s giving Michael.

“Oh, I see it,” Michael lies, moving away from Calum because he’s been standing behind him for too long and it’s getting awkward. Not that Michael minds, but just to spare Calum.

“77, then,” Michael says.

They begin playing and go through it with ease, flying through the song at the beats per measure it’s meant to be, which is really fucking fast—over three beats per second.

“Mikey, when’s the New Year’s thing?” Calum asks when they stop at 85 to take a quick break and go over some more things.  
“A couple weeks,” Michael responds. “Why?”

“Just wanted to know. Wanna do 85?”

Michael nods because he doesn’t know what else to say. Being in this room with just Calum is making Michael’s brain turn off.

They start playing.

Eventually they’ve covered the entire song, start to finish, and from their point of view it’s practically perfected. Calum has a water bottle with him, and he takes a sip when Michael asks him if he could have a drink too. Calum hands the bottle over to him without any question and Michael quickly gulps some down.

“Know where you’re going for college?” Calum asks.

“Juilliard, hopefully, trying to practice for an audition,” Michael says. “You?”

“Not sure, checking for sports scholarships,” Calum shrugs as he tells Michael.

“You could get one, you know,” Michael says. “You play super well, it wouldn’t be hard.”

“You too, performing at Juilliard doesn’t seem at all out of your reach,” Calum says back.

The conversation is getting dry and Michael’s getting ridiculously impatient. He just wants to date Calum already, hold his hand and go on picnics and just know that Calum and him are a thing, a real thing and not an idea in Michael’s utopia. It all sounds so movie-like, this whole crush, and Michael hates it.

At this point, Michael’s brain just kind of goes “fuck it” and before Michael’s aware of it, he’s saying, “Um, I was wondering if you wanted to--”

Thankfully or not, Calum interrupts Michael before he can finish the sentence and says, “Wanna play 85?”

And then Calum realizes Michael’s in the middle of saying something. “What?”

“Oh, nothing, I was just gonna suggest that too,” Michael says, shrugging off his almost-asking-Calum-out-on-a-date sentence like it’s nothing. God, Michael’s never felt more stressed in his life.

There’s too much happening and not enough at the same time and it’s driving Michael mad. He can’t imagine what might happen if he does manage to fully ask Calum out, and Calum pulls the “oh no, we’re just 100% completely platonic pals and I could never imagine myself dating you” but even worse, Michael wouldn’t know what to do with himself if Calum agreed to go out on a date with him. It’s this ridiculous never-ending cycle of _ask or be asked or suffer emotional distress forever_ , and Michael can’t stand it.

Now Michael’s ideal utopia is waiting until Calum asks him out, but not even God knows when that’s gonna happen.

They play measure 85. Michael is getting increasingly stressed with every second spent in this little room with Calum by his side as totally platonic pals. He has to get out.

“Wanna go check on what Luke and Ash are doing?” Michael asks.

Calum gathers his music together in a neat pile and nods, and they head out. Michael opens the door for Calum and catches a whiff of the cologne he’s wearing. It’s strong and it makes Michael’s nose hurt but he likes it anyway. Goddamnit.

Three different things occur when Michael and Calum leave the room and see Luke and Ashton.

First, Calum gasps-- _loudly_ , too.

Second, Luke and Ashton part lips with wide eyes as they look towards each other and then at Michael and Calum, who’ve witnessed the entire thing.

Third, Michael mutters “What the fuck.”

Shit has hit the fan, and it’s obvious that everyone else in the room thinks the same thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wooo finished also please please pLEASE come talk 2 me about this on [my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com) it!! would!! mean!! a!! lot!!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter 6 !! woo 4 more chapters n the epilogue 2 go and i have the entire thing planned out for the most part !!! i would lov 2 get this done b4 slfl starts but u kno what happens happens anyway enough of me rambling (also this is unedited bc i dont have that kind of time lmao)

People have probably noticed something's up. They definitely have, because at the next jazz band rehearsal Luke and Ashton aren't talking to each other, and Michael and Calum don't seem to be exchanging anything more than nervous glances and motions towards Luke and Ashton. Who haven't talked to each other since  _ The Kisscident _ , which is what Michael's calling it. Plus, from what Michael can tell, anyone that tries to talk to either of them ends up leaving the conversation about six seconds in, probably because neither of them want to talk about it anyway.

It's so strange that Luke and Ashton aren't talking, because they're  _ always _ talking. Always, they never seem to shut up to one another and suddenly they join lips and they just stop.

Michael hasn't even gotten a chance to talk to Luke or Ashton about it, since the two of them both rushed out the music store roughly 5 seconds after Michael and Calum found them.

Due to this, Michael's found himself becoming closer to Calum, because without Luke and Ashton to distract either of them, they have to face each other. It's scaring Michael but he supposes it's alright.

Halfway through Michael realizes they need Luke and Ashton together, and by they, he means the entire goddamn jazz band. Ashton hasn't played a single note on beat the entire rehearsal, and Luke's so wigged out he completely missed his solo in Jazz Police. Michael keeps turning around to find Luke sadly sighing as he readjusts his amp or his guitar and Ashton looking like a goddamn lost puppy every time he stops playing. 

“Ashton, you doing okay back there?” Feldmann also seems to have noticed how off Ashton is because he asks and it jolts Ashton out of whatever trance he’s in. 

“What? Oh, yeah, um, I’m fine,” Ashton says, taking his hand and pushing his hair off of his forehead. 

“Okay, you look a little out of it today,” Feldmann comments.

“Just tired,” Ashton says. 

Michael is looking at Luke as Ashton says the words and feels like he’s watching a bad romantic sitcom that he’s somehow gotten himself into. 

“Alright…” Feldmann says, turning back to the band. “Take it from the second repeat, guys.”

Michael doesn’t even have time to wordlessly communicate with Calum about the interaction because Feldmann is waving his hand and the band begins playing again. 

(He can see out of the corner of his eye that the sheet music in front of him isn’t Calum’s main focus.) 

They stop playing again because Feldmann needs to check a rhythm of the trumpets’. Calum and Michael turn to each other. 

_ We’re fucked _ , Calum mouths.

_ No _ , Michael mouths back,  _ they’re fucked _ .

Michael watches Luke and Ashton as much as he watches Calum for the remainder of the jazz practice. Neither of them even dare to look at each other, nor do they make any attempt at communication. They both have their heads either facing the conductor or looking at the ground, and Michael can’t bear to watch the anticlimactic scene unfolding in front of him. 

Michael can’t imagine what this might look like to an outsider’s point of view. Knowing that every day Luke and Ashton cannot seem to stop interacting with one another all throughout the rehearsal and suddenly walking in one day to find that they’ve simply stopped their contact with each other. It’s almost unbelievable. Plus, if Michael and Calum look as worried as they seem, it might even seem worse. And it totally is. 

Jazz doesn’t get any better. Even if Ashton is checked in on multiple times by several band members as well as Feldmann, and Luke keeps finding himself shaken out of the trance he’s in and seems like he’s paying attention, they’re not doing any better than they were an hour ago. Ashton seems to have given up his on-time and on-beat drumming entirely, which is throwing the rest of the band way off, and Luke is just done. 

Feldmann makes a statement reminding the band that their next performance is in three jazz rehearsals’ (excluding this one) time, meaning two weeks, and they have to have Jazz Police, Whiplash, and Samba Del Gringo down by then. 

Michael notices that he’s looking at both Luke and Ashton when he says this, probably reminding them that they need to up their game by then otherwise everything will really be out of wack, as if it isn’t already. They’re both not even looking at Feldmann, fiddling around with their instruments and avoiding eye contact at all costs. 

By the end, the two of them scramble to get their instruments together and put away and rush out opposite doors, which is so unbelievably unlike them it somehow manages to shock Michael even more. 

He doesn’t (even though he should) make note of how, in their frenzy, they cross paths, Ashton bumping into Luke with a cymbal in his hands. Neither of them say a word. 

“Calum!” Michael hisses to the boy, putting away his trombone and taking his grand old time as he empties out the spit thingy (Michael has no idea what it’s called, but it’s gross and may quite possibly be the worst thing about Calum) into the trash. 

His head perks up at the sound of his name and he immediately turns Michael’s way. 

“God damnit, they’re so ridiculously stubborn,” Michael says. 

“Well, what are we supposed to do?”

“What do you mean? Our first performance is in three weeks, they’re not talking to each other, and we, my dear friend, are fucked,” Michael says, raising his brows. 

“Have you talked to him about it? Luke, have you said anything?” Calum asks. 

Michael’s about to reply, some objection because he’s worked up and very concerned when he realizes that he actually hasn’t. He hasn’t spoken to Luke once since Calum and him saw the two of them kissing, and maybe this is the real issue. 

“Hey, boys?”

An outside voice interrupts their banter. It’s Feldmann, and he looks almost as concerned as Michael, though it may not necessarily be for the same reason. 

“Yeah, Feldy?” Calum asks. 

“Do either of you guys know what’s going on with Luke and Ash? They’re acting strange today, I was wondering if you knew anything,” Feldmann asks. 

Calum and Michael exchange a quick glance, eyes mildly wide as they try to talk without words and figure out if they should tell a white lie, not say anything at all, or spit out the truth. 

“Not sure, maybe they’re just off today? We could talk to them if you wanted,” Michael says before Calum even opens his mouth. Calum gives a quick nod, signaling to Michael that that was probably the way to go. 

“That’d be great, thanks Mike. Can’t have our best drummer and best guitar player off for our first performance, can we?” Feldmann asks. 

Calum and Michael both awkwardly chuckle and agree with yeah’s and no we can’t’s before Feldmann leaves the two of them to go to his office. 

“You gonna talk to Ashton, then?” Michael asks Calum. 

“What? Um, should I? We’re not really as close as you and Luke. I’ve only known him since jazz started,” Calum says. 

“It’s worth a shot? Also, you’re strong, if Ashton gets aggressive you can handle it. I, on the other hand, resemble the same stiffness and strength as a marshmallow,” Michael jokes, trying to lighten the mood. Although he really does mean it; Ashton gets aggressive sometimes and Michael would much rather deal with sad, mopey Luke than angry, bothered Ashton. 

Calum chuckles. “Thanks, I guess? I’ll see if I can talk to him. I have lots going on, we have a game in a  few minutes so I have to get going.”

“Oh, well, good luck. Speak with Ash when you can,” Michael says. 

“You’re welcome to come, it’s home. Not a lot of people show up to the game anyway, football’s a lot bigger. I mean, if you’re not busy,” Calum offers. 

Michael’s face lights up at the idea, even though his homework grades in his classes are going to regret it. 

“Yeah, sure. I’d love to come,” Michael says. 

He doesn’t bring up the part about how he really would not mind seeing Calum sweat in his uniform for an hour and a half, but just because he doesn’t say it aloud doesn’t mean it’s not true. 

He supposes Luke will have to wait until after Calum’s game, but that can’t hurt. All Luke’s gonna be doing is his homework and he might be eating, too. Trying to mask his “I fucked up” feelings. 

**;**

Even though Michael’s there at Calum’s request, he still doesn’t like how all the jock boys look at him when Calum waves. 

He waved back, but he still doesn’t like how they watch him afterwards. 

Calum seems so at home when he’s on the field. He passes through the players with ease and seems to be able to handle the ball without even looking at it. 

Michael wonders if Calum feels more at home here than in band. 

It’s effortless the way Calum scores goals, like he was planning on it the entire time but also like he hadn’t even thought about it and just did it. It’s effortless how he pushes his sweaty, curly hair back from where it hangs over his forehead with a single swipe of his hand. It’s effortless how he seems to be nothing but himself on the field, laughing and joking with all the other boys as Michael sits in the stands. 

He feels like he’s reenacting a sad version of the You Belong With Me music video by Taylor Swift, like he’s Taylor and Calum is that blonde dude, except he’s not in marching band and also Calum isn’t dating anyone. But he feels like it anyway, with how separated him and Calum are. 

It feels weird, how he sits on the cold metal and watches. 

Which reminds him, it’s fucking cold and Michael doesn’t understand how they’re running around with thin skin-tight long sleeved shirts and shorts in this goddamn weather while Michael has a beanie, a denim jacket, a sweater, and jeans on. And he’s not even the one playing. It’s the winter season, for Pete’s sake, shouldn’t they be inside? 

This is why Michael doesn’t understand the American school system. 

Calum certainly doesn’t show how chilly he is when he’s playing, but when he’s sitting on the bench for a little, Michael can see him crossing his arms and shivering. It makes Michael want to jump off the bleachers and bro hug him. Or bear hug him, whichever one Calum wants more. 

It’s half time now, which basically means they all get about an eight minute break because it’s too damn cold for anyone to want to perform on the windy field. 

Michael’s on his phone, contemplating on whether or not he should text Luke about  _ The Kisscident _ or text him to tell him he wants to talk about  _ The Kisscident _ . He’s about to type out a ‘hey, is it ok if i come over in like 30 min? we should talk’ when the familiar presence of a beautiful, talented brown boy appears in front of him. 

“Hey, dude,” Calum says, sitting down. 

“You must be freezing,” Michael comments. 

“You bet your ass I am,” Calum says back, shivering. 

Michael feels obligated to give Calum his jacket. So he does. Calum smiles a look of relief and thanks to Michael and Michael doesn’t know why but he suddenly feels 100% more boyfriend-y with Calum now. Maybe it’s the fact that Calum’s wearing his fucking jacket. Because Michael gave him his fucking jacket. 

Michael also makes a mental note to give Calum his jacket more often, because he looks  _ very _ nice in it. 

“Thanks,” Calum says. 

“Sure,” Michael responds before he mentally hits himself in the head for saying “sure”. What a dumb move. He’s trying to date him, not be forever platonic with him, goddamnit. 

Calum and Michael both sit together on the metal bleachers, waiting for halftime to be over. Michael can feel Calum almost leaning his head in the crook between Michael’s shoulder and his neck but he readjusts himself and sits straight. Michael swears silently. 

He almost joins their hands.  _ Almost _ being the key word, because as he slides it across the hard bench he panics and reels it back in, acting like nothing’s happened.

They both hear the warning whistle, meaning Calum has to get back to the field soon because the game is starting back up. 

“Thanks for letting me borrow your jacket,” Calum says, pulling it off his shoulders. 

Before Michael can stop himself, he replies, “You can keep it you know. Not forever, but for the rest of the game if you’d like.”

It seems like the right choice of words, because Calum grins and nods, jogging off the bleachers as he puts the jacket back on. Michael feels like he’s just claimed Calum as his, that Calum is wearing  _ his _ jacket and not anybody else’s and that means that Calum is  _ his _ . 

Michael can see the other jocks talking to Calum and picking at the denim and Calum points to Michael at one point in time, smiling at him. The other boys laugh and Michael can only imagine what it’s about. They all nudge Calum’s shoulders and Calum seems still, less vibrant than before. 

Michael can see him smiling softly to himself. 

Another whistle blows and Calum takes off the jacket and jumps back into the game like he never even left. 

**;**

By the time the game seems to be ending, their team is leading 3-1, Michael’s arranged for himself to go over to Luke’s after the game is done, and Calum is in control of the ball. 

Michael is only half-paying attention at this point, looking at either his phone or watching Calum. His jacket is neatly folded on the bench by the field where Calum’s water bottle is. 

Michael’s regretting giving Calum his jacket only slightly, because he’s fucking cold now and he wishes he would have it back, but it’s definitely worth seeing Calum in it.

The game ends a couple minutes later with Calum pulling a Troy Bolton and scoring as the time went down, bringing the score up to a solid 4-1 which Michael supposes is pretty decent (he has no clue how much of a win it is) because the entire team pulls a Wildcats and lifts Calum up in the air, even though it’s only like, the second game of the winter season. 

Michael even ventures down to the field himself to go congratulate Calum, making him feel like Gabriella even though he is nowhere near as smart as she is. Also, he’s really cold and wants his jacket back so he can head to Luke’s.

He approaches the cheering team and he can see all the boys winking and laughing as Calum heads over, an embarrassed smile on his face with the jacket in his hands. 

“Hey, thanks for the jacket,” Calum says.

“Good goal,” Michael replies. 

“Thanks,” Calum says. 

“What are your friends laughing about?” Michael asks, motioning his head towards the group of soccer players several feet away, all in a huddle and smirking. Calum turns his head and sees them too. They wink at him. 

“They… they’re teasing me about stuff,” Calum says shyly. 

“Like what?”

“Like how you gave me your jacket. Think we’re dating,” Calum says. 

“Are they opposed to that?” Michael asks, raising his eyebrows. 

Calum shakes his head and Michael can see the smile Calum’s trying to hide. “No, think it’s cute. They’re just teasing me about it, like how you would tease your friend if they had a crush.”

Michael’s turning red now so he pretends that his phone is going off, pulling it out of his pants pocket. “Luke,” he says. “Gonna go talk about the kiss.”

Calum nods and smiles and Michael turns around, starting to head off the field. 

“Michael?”

Michael turns around to see Calum crossing his arms over his chest, visibly shaking. 

“Thanks for the jacket, again,” Calum says. 

“No problem. See you tomorrow.”

Michael walks away and his mind is racing at the word ‘crush’ coming out of Calum’s mouth and how he’s suddenly a lot more timid than he normally is and how he thanked Michael about three times for his jacket and it’s making his entire body light up. He’s halfway to Luke’s house when he thinks that he probably should have given Calum his jacket again, what with the sight of him, but he supposes there’ll always be more opportunities. 

He hopes there are more opportunities. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> feedback ??? feedback would be SUPER nice lets talk abt this fic on [my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com) !!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guess whos back... back again.. its me anyway first off i have a 5 day weekend which is the only reason this chapter is finished, secondly i wanted to finish this fic b4 slfl starts but it starts in less than a week so nevermind and third, once again shoutout to [mar](http://archiveofourown.org/users/dumbmichael) for betaing this i lov u ur the best and lets just go 4 it man

****Luke is cooped up in the basement doing his physics homework when Michael arrives. Liz lets him in, telling Michael that Luke hasn’t seemed to see the light of day for a while now, and Michael feels a little guilty when he doesn't say why and just nods as if it’s news to him.

Michael scurries downstairs and finds Luke on his stomach on the carpeted floor, his textbook and notebook open in front of him.

“Hey dude,” Michael says, shrugging his backpack off his shoulder and against the wall.

“How was the game?” Luke asks without looking up.

“Good. They won,” Michael says. “I gave Calum my jacket and I am also pretty sure Calum has a crush on me.”

“Did he say anything?” Luke asks, finally pulling his eyes away from his book and looking at Michael excitedly.

“He was like, getting teased by his team ‘cause I gave him my jacket, and then he said something about how the teasing was like how your friends would tease you when you have a crush, like how I tease you. So yeah,” Michael says, satisfied. He sits down on the couch opposite where Luke is laying.

“Cute. You should ask him out,” Luke says.

“Fuck no.”

“Why not? Jesus Christ, if you both like each other than there is no reason why you shouldn’t already be dating,” Luke says, getting up and sitting next to Michael, scoffing.

Michael rolls his eyes. “It doesn’t work like that. You should know.”

He realizes not even a moment later that he really shouldn’t have said that last part because Luke looks down and Michael feels bad. It was a bit rash but Michael is a generally rash person, so.

“Have you talked to him?” Michael asks, changing the topic.

“Who?” Luke says, even though Michael knows Luke knows damn well who Michael is referring to.

“Ashton, you idiot,” Michael rolls his eyes. “Who else would I be talking about?”

“No.”

“No, you haven’t talked to him?” Michael reiterates, even though he assumed Luke hasn’t said anything to him since _The Kisscident_ anyway.

Luke shakes his head.

“What happened that day? And don’t act like you don’t know what the fuck I’m talking about,” Michael asks.

Luke sighs. He was clearly trying to avoid the topic, which is precisely why Michael brought it up. Luke can’t hide from his fears forever, no matter how hard he tries.

“We kissed.”

“I _know_ ,” Michael says, “I saw you guys. Then you both rushed out and as far as I know, you haven’t talked since. What happened _before_ then?”

“I don’t know, you guys went into that back room and Ash and I were just talking and he was fooling around on the snare and I was fooling around on my guitar and we just looked at each other and _kissed_ ,” Luke says, clearly distraught.

“Did you kiss him?”

“We kissed each other.”

“Okay, but did you _initiate_ the kiss? Did you lean in first or did he?” Michael feels like Luke is dragging out the conversation on purpose, trying to avoid the nitty-gritty details and get through the gist of it before he starts crying.

“I…I don’t know, I guess I did? He kissed me back, it wasn’t like, one-sided or anything.”

“So he knows you like him,” Michael states.

“He does?”

“Luke, you fucking kissed him. Of course he knows. And he probably likes you back considering he returned the kiss,” Michael says as though it’s the most obvious thing in the world (which really, it is).

Michael feels ridiculous, feels like the sidekick in a Disney Channel movie that’s trying to get the two main characters together but it isn’t working out, feels like he has a script in front of him and so do Luke and Ashton and Calum, feels like he’s being filmed through the window by some 12-year-old for a school project.

“He…he likes me back?” Luke asks almost silently, and Michael isn’t even sure if Luke actually says the words or if he’s just imagining it until Luke looks up at Michael with a particularly desperate look on his face.

Michael immediately feels almost _bad_ for the boy, and how much he wants to know yet fails to realize what’s literally right before his eyes. “Listen man, first of all, I’m shit at relationship advice considering I’ve been pining over a boy for about a month now, but I am ninety-eight percent sure Ashton likes you back. _You kissed each other_ ,” Michael says.

Luke still looks nervous and Michael knows his best friend and knows that when they go to school tomorrow Luke still isn’t going to talk to Ashton, but it’s a start.

“Hey, can you help me with my math? Pre-calc sucks major ass,” Michael says, changing the subject. He can tell Luke doesn’t want to talk about this anymore, doesn’t want to bring up how he thinks he’s completely ruined the relationship between him and Ashton when really, he’s probably progressed it. Michael still has no idea why Luke is still so worried, but he’s known Luke long enough to know that Luke is just a worrier in general, no reasoning behind it.

Nonetheless, Luke nods and smiles as he eagerly jumps off the couch and gets his notebook and pencil from the floor below. Michael goes to his backpack and shuffles through it for the pre-calc homework he was supposed to hand in a week and a half ago.

Michael doesn’t even pay attention to the things Luke is telling him, as he points his pencil eraser to the different things in Michael’s textbook. He’s too busy trying to think of ways to get his two best friends back together, all while going after Calum. The decline in his pre-calc grade is worth it, he supposes.

**;**

There’s still no sign of either Luke or Ashton warming back up to each other at school the next day. They now sit at opposite sides of the lunch table and don’t even look up from their damn food, picking at it instead of eating it like what the average human being would do at such an hour.

Calum has also made their lunch table his designated spot for what Michael hopes is the rest of the year, but he needs Calum now more than ever because the silence between Luke and Ashton is unbearable and Michael has never wanted to not consume the food in front of him so much until now.

He and Calum don’t even talk either, their table just unnecessarily awkward nothing, but Calum next to Michael is something neither of them will ever get tired of.

Michael decides that the silence, as insufferable as it is, is enough. He nudges Calum’s elbow, jolting the macaroni and cheese off of the fork he’s holding into the plastic container below. Calum turns his head to Michael and without speaking, Michael mouths, _Have you talked to him?_

 _Who?_ Calum says back. _Ashton?_

Michael nods ever so gently because even though there’s a highly unlikely chance it’ll happen -- neither of them have looked up from the table, he doesn’t want Luke or Ashton to see them talking.

Calum shakes his head and purses his lips together. Michael sighs.

 _You need to soon_ , he mouths again. This is getting out of hand.

“I know, but Ashton won’t talk to anybody. He hasn’t uttered a word in AP Music Theory since last week,” Calum forgoes the whole mouthing thing and just whispers to Michael, but it’s as good as mouthing because it’s practically just as quiet.

Michael sighs again because the two of them are being so stubborn and Michael can’t take another minute of it. But he has to, because Luke and Ashton have made it quite obvious that they don’t want to even acknowledge each other’s existence for a little while.

Michael wonders if he and Calum are destined to have the same fate, to one day kiss without warning and then find it so ridiculously embarrassing that they just _stop talking_. Michael really hopes that doesn’t happen, because Michael would not last a day without Calum in his life and he knows it.

He hopes Calum is thinking the same thing, because then maybe they stand a chance.

“Make him talk to you,” Michael says, sounding a little bit like a villain when he does.

“How? He’s been avoiding everyone,” Calum asks back, still just as quiet as before.

“Just do it? You have to get him in a place where he can’t run away, though,” Michael says. “Ask him to drive you home today.”

Calum sighs just like Michael’s been doing before nodding his head. “Fine, I will. But only because we have to fix this.”

They turn back to face front and nobody utters another word at lunch. When the bell rings, they all part ways, Michael going with Luke to their next class as Calum jogs to catch up with his other friends -- the ones that were teasing Calum at the soccer game -- and Ashton getting up and walking in the opposite direction Michael and Luke are going in.

He really hopes Calum talks to Ashton soon, he can’t deal with this for much longer.

Michael is heading home from class that day when his phone lights up with a notification from Calum.

**from: calum <3 [2:23 PM]**

> Ash just dropped me off

**to: calum <3 [2:24 PM]**

> howd it go

**from: calum <3 [2:24 PM]**

> Alright

**to: calum <3 [2:24 PM]**

> can u elaborate or am i just gonna have to guess

Michael waits because Calum doesn’t respond immediately. He turns his phone off but can’t handle the pressure and turns it back on, watching as the little three dots appear in the corner. Calum’s taking a while which means that a lot of shit actually happened, and Michael’s not sure if he wants to know or not anymore.

**from: calum <3 [2:26 PM]**

> Alright basically I managed to bring the topic up and because ash was driving he couldn’t like avoid it and I was like “have you talked to Luke in a while” and he didn’t say anything at first but then he like shook his head really stiffly and I said “why not?” And he didn’t answer but I managed to like butter him up I guess and then he said this really long thing in one breath that I couldn’t understand but it was basically him saying that he’s too scared to because that was the first move either of them made and he thinks Luke hates him because they both ran out

As Michael suspects, it’s a long text and it takes him over a minute to read but once he does he gets it, he gets why Luke and Ashton aren’t talking. Luke is worried that he made a mistake and shouldn’t have kissed him but Ashton is scared that they’re moving too fast and that Luke doesn’t want to do this too quickly.

**to: calum <3 [2:28 PM]**

> well then

**from: calum <3  [2:28 PM]** 

> Yeah

**to: calum <3 [2:28 PM]**

> we’re gonna have 2 figure out a way for them 2 both realize that they want 2 date and they’re just bein dumb

**from: calum <3 [2:29 PM]**

> How are we going to do that

**to: calum <3 [2:29 PM]**

> idk

**from: calum <3 [2:30 PM]**

> Well that’s very helpful isnt it

**to: calum <3 [2:30 PM]**

> shut up

They stop texting after that and Michael turns his phone off, dropping it carelessly back into his pocket before continuing on his way home.

Once home, Michael debates on whether or not he should let Luke know what he knows about this whole thing. A part of him is saying yes, he should tell Luke because that’s going to make everyone’s life so much easier and Luke and Ashton will most likely get together very soon if he tells Luke. But another part of him is saying that he shouldn’t, because Ashton told those things to Calum out of trust and Michael’s not the type of person to do Ashton like that.

It all kind of sucks, because even though there doesn’t seem to be a real damn solution, the answer is right in front of them all.

Because everything’s out of wack right now, Michael actually pulls out the binder in his backpack and starts working on his homework. When he finishes it all, he gets in bed and only falls asleep after replaying the past week’s events over in his head, trying to figure out a way to solve everything.

**;**

Nothing changes at jazz band the next day. They’ve become shittier because Luke and Ashton have become even more distant, and Michael feels bad.

Feldy hasn’t said anything either, not to Michael or Calum or Luke or Ashton. And even though only Michael and Calum truly know what’s been going on, everyone in jazz seems to have the exact same look on their face no matter how much fun they have with everyone else. Their faces all say _we’re fucked_ and Michael and Calum can’t help but start to agree.

The worst part is that everyone’s too nice in jazz band, they’re too friendly and respectful and no one’s gonna tell Luke and Ashton that they aren’t doing a great job, because Luke and Ashton still haven’t seemed to notice for themselves that they are lacking in the jazz band department. So everyone’s just stuck as Luke and Ashton both keep fucking up without knowing it and getting the band nowhere.

Granted, the only people mean enough to let them know that they’re actually shit right now are Michael and Calum, but even they don’t want to say anything because everything’s just kind of a mess.

It has been for a while, at least.

Michael takes it upon himself to deliver the message, and when the entire jazz band see him walking over to Luke and Ashton after practice is over, they all seem to have a weight lifted off their shoulders.

“Luke, Ash, wait a sec,” Michael says before either of them have the chance to leave. Luke quickly unplugs his guitar and is putting it in the case, and Ashton is grabbing his sheet music off the stand. “I know neither of you want to stay in this room any longer than you have to, but just hear me out.”

“What, Mike?” Luke says, sighing. Michael can tell Luke is tired and he just wants to go home so he doesn’t have to keep looking at Ashton anymore.

“No offense because both of you are talented little shits at what you guys do, but you guys have been, well, sucking some major ass recently,” Michael explains as nicely as he can, even though Michael isn’t good at letting people down easy.

Ashton looks perplexed. “What?”

“Like, seriously, no offense, but neither of you have been on top of your game with jazz. Luke, you keep missing chords and fucking them up and Ashton, you keep missing entire beats and you don’t have as much energy playing -- neither of you do -- and I know things are hard but seriously, you guys have to work on this. It’s not helping any of us,” Michael says.

Calum’s come up behind Michael at this point and he rests his hand on the older boy’s shoulder and nods along. “Yeah, I know that things are kind of rough right now and the last thing you guys want to hear are how under your game you both are but Michael’s right. Even though life is messy right now, jazz band shouldn’t be as affected as it is.”

“Sorry,” Luke mutters before scampering off, throwing his guitar over his shoulder by the strap. Ashton nods solemnly gathering his drumsticks. He starts disassembling the drum kit for concert band the next day. Michael and Calum take it as their cue to leave.

“Progress?” Calum asks, smiling sadly but hopefully.

Michael nods back to him. “Progress.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as usual, talk 2 me abt this on [my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com) bc i really appreciate it rip


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YES one more official chapter 2 go and then the epilogue!!
> 
> if you haven't noticed, i changed the chapter count from 11 to 10 solely because i didn't think i'd need an extra chapter before i got to the end of the fic!!
> 
> also - this chapter is a major filler but there's some hardcore malum action so i suppose it's not a complete waste !!

Like usual, there’s no visible improvement the next day at school. Which is kind of what Michael is expecting, to be honest. Even though it seems abnormal (because it is, really. It’s like, an alternative universe in this universe, if you will) it’s gotten to the point where Michael just assumes that today will be another boring day, his two best friends not talking to each other and his other best friend slash romantic interest will be trying to help. Just a good ol’ day in Michael’s life. It’s only been roughly a week, after all. 

It’s Friday afternoon. Michael’s sitting in his dumb health class, waiting for the time to pass (Michael also makes a mental note to research why time seems to go slower when you’re counting down the minutes) when he gets a text from Calum. Because Michael always cleverly picks out his seats and is usually in the back -- unless some teacher still thinks it’s cool to do everything by last name alphabetically -- he’s able to check. 

**from: calum <3 [1:17 PM]**

> Hey would u maybe wanna meet @ like the pizza place or something after school? Just the two of us?

Michael has no idea how to react. Did Calum just ask him out on a date? Like, an official date? Michael panics. There’s no mistaking this for anything but a date, not when Calum has provided a location (the pizza place) and the amount of people who are going to be there (just the two of them). Before Michael gets a chance to process everything and text back, he gets another text. 

**from: calum <3 [1:18 PM]**

> Woah, Jesus, sorry didn’t mean to make that sound like we were going out or something. 

**from: calum <3 [1:18 PM]**

> Unless you wanted to make it sound like that, in which case, yeah, totally let’s go get pizza after school alone like on a date. 

**from: calum <3 [1:18 PM]**

> Also we should really try and figure out this whole Luke ash thing

**to: calum <3 [1:19 PM]**

> after school? sure

**to: calum <3 [1:19 PM]**

> also dw abt it man and we should prob talk abt them n try 2 solve this

(Michael really hopes Calum’s going to call it a date. He is.)

**from: calum <3 [1:19 PM]**

> Ok cool i can meet u in the band room and we can head from there

**to: calum <3 [1:19 PM]**

> alright bf

The ‘bf’ part might be a bit much, but Michael doesn’t have time to think about it before he hits send, prompting him to panic (again) and hope that Calum thinks he’s joking or return the favor. 

Calum doesn’t respond for three minutes.

**from: calum <3 [1:22 PM]**

> Haha

Michael hates Calum now. Not really, but he hates how vague his last text was. Now Michael is going to spend the rest of the day wondering what the ‘Haha’ means in terms of Calum and how he feels about Michael and it will drive Michael up the wall. Maybe it means that Calum thinks he’s joking. Or, maybe it means that Michael made Calum uncomfortable and Calum had no idea what to respond. 

Michael wonders if the ‘Haha’ is better than no reply at all. He supposes it is, because at least it gives him  _ something _ to base his thoughts off. 

Eventually the end of the day rolls around and Michael is getting increasingly more stressed as he nears the band room. He walks into the room and already he is overwhelmed with the stiffness of the atmosphere, which must mean that Luke and Ashton are in here somewhere. He knows his friends. 

Michael’s suspicions are right because Ashton is in the back practice room, banging away at the drum kit, probably because of what Michael said to him at jazz a few days ago. He can also see Luke, right outside, strumming on his guitar in an effort to improve upon his last few mishaps as well. He can also see that the both of them are trying very hard to ignore each other, but it’s not difficult to spot when Luke glances up at Ashton when Ashton is too busy drumming to notice, or when Ashton sneaks a peak at Luke while Luke is tuning or something. 

It’s not just annoying at this point, now it’s just sad. 

Calum walks in a couple moments later and Michael feels relieved to say the least, glad Calum hasn’t forgotten. 

“Hey, Mike,” Calum says, calling him from the entrance that he walked through. 

“Hey,” Michael says. It seems like Calum has also noticed the unfortunate scene in front of him. 

“Pizza?”

Michael nods, glad he has Calum to take him away from this mess. 

Calum’s already got his license, which is something that Michael needs to do as well. He doesn’t know when he’d ever need a license; he doesn’t have a car and he doesn’t know when he’d ever be able to get one, but it’d still be nice. 

Calum’s car is nice. It smells faintly of the grass and also of sweat, so Michael’s just going to guess Calum has a lot of his unwashed soccer stuff in the trunk. 

One thing Michael has no idea about is said pizza place, because Michael never goes out for pizza. Especially not when he only ever eats pizza at Luke’s house, and it’s always homemade. Liz makes the best pizza Michael’s ever had. 

“You ever been to Anthony’s?” Calum asks, pulling into the parking lot of a small little pizzeria on the edge of a large shopping complex. 

Michael’s embarrassed to say no, but he does anyway. 

“ _ Never _ ? Oh my God, you’ll love it. They make the best damn pizza in the whole world. Me and the team always come here after a win to celebrate it. The owner loves us,” Calum raves on about this pizza place, and Michael decides to see if this pizza really  _ is _ the best. He think’s Liz Hemmings’ famous secret recipe is a tough act to beat. 

“I never go out for pizza,” Michael says, shrugging. He fiddles with Calum’s car door, trying to open it, when Calum says to press down and then pull out and he finally manages to escape the vehicle. 

“Wow, you’re really missing out.”

“Not really. I go over to Luke’s place for pizza a bit, his mom’s recipe is by far the best one I’ve ever had.”

“Really? I should check it out then, but I bet it’s not as good as this place,” Calum says, smirking. They’re walking in and the man behind the counter immediately recognizes Calum and waves to him, smiling. Calum waves back. 

“Wanna make that official?” Michael says, raising his eyebrows as they go to decide what to order. Really, it’s only Michael who need to pick; Calum comes here so often he’s practically memorized the menu. 

“Tell you what, one day I’ll bring some pizza from this place to Luke’s house and we’ll have a pizza-off. Luke can be blindfolded and taste each one and then he can be the judge,” Calum says, crossing his arms and smirking, like he’s trying to get Michael not to accept. 

“You’re on, and when Liz’s pizza reigns I’ll be sure to send some of her pizza to console you,” Michael says. He picks one of the pizza combinations already on the menu, too lazy to decide on his own toppings. 

“Usual for me, Anthony,” Calum says, and the man nods, knowing exactly what that means.

They pick a booth in the back corner of the restaurant, somewhere where they can discuss the real issue at hand without people hearing them in the mildly busy place.

“So…” Michael begins, ending his word in a whistle and staring out the window. He’s not really sure how to start this. 

“We could always lock them in a room together until they figure out their feelings,” Calum suggests, and Michael’s not sure if he’s joking or not. 

“We could,” Michael says. “But I don’t know if they’d ever forgive us. We aren’t  _ that _ bad at trying to solve things between them, are we?”

“I don’t know, it seems like a good idea. They’d forgive us if they ended up making out against a wall,” Calum reasons. 

“You got me there.” Michael laughs, pointing a finger gun at Calum and winking, causing Calum to burst out into laughter as well. Michael likes hearing Calum laugh. He should try to get him to laugh more often.

Anthony calls Calum’s name at that point with their pizza slices in his hand. Calum gets up and Michael follows, even though Calum knows this place and the people who work here like the back of his palm and probably doesn’t need accompaniment. 

Once they reach the counter, Calum fishes through his wallet and Michael follows, when Calum puts his hand on top of Michael’s, signifying that he intends to pay for his as well. 

“Dude, no way,” Michael says to Calum, objecting. 

“Just let me, if this is a date then I’m gonna pay for your damn pizza,” Calum says back. 

The word ‘date’ just completely throws Michael off his game again, and he has to pause before he can reply, trying to process the whole thing for the millionth time. Technically, they are on a date. It’s just the two of them at a pizza place, and to an outsider it probably does look more like a date than a ‘just two dudes who are best friends hanging out and getting pizza’ type of situation. The only thing is that neither of them have made any sort of romantic move on the other one, other than the whole touching hands thing like a minute ago. But other than that, Michael doesn’t know if and or when one of them will actually initiate anything. 

He doesn’t want to make the same mistake that Luke and Ashton did. 

They walk back to the booth and Michael is about to dumbly say something about the whole thing when he notices that Calum isn’t paying attention to him and is looking at something, or more specifically  _ someone _ else. 

“Hood!”

Michael turns around to find what he’d probably call a posse of boys strolling in, some he recognizes and some he doesn’t. One thing he does know about them is that they’re all on the soccer team. 

“Hey!” Calum shouts back, standing up and walking over, neglecting both Michael and his pizza. 

“Oh, did we interrupt something? Are you on a  _ date _ ?” one of them asks, causing Calum to shift slightly. 

There it is, the word ‘date’ again swooping in like it’s nobody’s damn business. It trips Michael out again, still not properly comprehending the fact that he and Calum are literally out on a date right now. 

“Um…” Calum starts replying, unsure of what to say. Michael knows that he doesn’t want to admit he’s on a date with his friends but he doesn’t want to say he’s simply not on one either. 

“Hood is on a date!” the boy says again, smiling widely and suggestively at Calum, who’s getting a bit red. 

“Guys…”

“No, Hood, it’s cute. It’s the guy that gave you his jacket, right? You like him loads,” another one pipes up. Michael’s again, taken aback by that last sentence. Does he not know something? Is there something he’s missing out on?

“Are you done?” Calum asks, smiling bashfully and staring at the floor. 

“For today, yes, but when we get to school Monday you’re not gonna hear the end of it,” the first boy smirks and even though Michael can only see the back of Calum’s head he knows he’s rolling his eyes. 

“Ugh, you guys are a pain in the ass,” Calum whines. 

“That’s what best friends are for, Hood!” 

Calum walks back to the booth they’re sitting at and immediately shakes his head. 

“Sorry about them, they don’t know how to keep their mouths shut. They aren’t… I don’t…” Calum begins, but Michael stops him before he can say anything Michael knows isn’t true. 

“Do you, Cal?” Michael asks, eyes sincere. 

Calum doesn’t respond for a minute and suddenly Michael fears that they’re gonna fuck this up, fuck what they have going on up, just like Luke and Ashton did. 

“ ’M not sure yet, Mike,” Calum says. “I might.”

“I can work with that,” Michael says, smiling to try and lighten the mood. “What do you think about an intervention?”

“An intervention? Dude, they’re having bro problems, not drug problems,” Calum says incredulously. 

“You never know, it could work,” Michael says, raising his eyebrows. 

“I vote against an intervention. Why don’t we just leave them to their own business with a bit of encouragement? This isn’t going to last forever,” Calum suggests. 

Michael thinks that’s the best idea that they’ve come up with. He nods in agreement, and the two of them both seem satisfied. 

They’re almost done with their pizzas when Michael asks, without warning, “so, does this count as a date? Everyone else seems to think so.”

“That depends, do you want it to be a date?” Calum says back, humming. His hand is resting on the table, playing with a salt shaker. Michael takes it in his own and smiles. 

“I think I do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as usual, catch me on the flip side or on [my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com)!!!!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy shit it's the last chapter !! wow what a ride this is also super cliche but i support it honestly have fun!! im very proud
> 
> also this is unedited bc i dont have the time

Michael’s decided that he hates the word ‘three’. Really, this is only because they have exactly three days until their early season show and Michael is definitely cracking under the pressure, but also because the word just leaves a bad taste in his mouth at this point, with it being the only thing anybody in jazz band happens to be talking about at this point. 

It’s stressful, because as the timer runs down to their show the timer goes down for how many days he has left to fix Luke and Ashton. Not that they’re broken, just have a little dent in them. 

At this point, Michael’s stopped paying attention during jazz band. There’s nothing different that’s ever going to happen, he’s going to play his notes somewhat perfectly, do his solos, roll his eyes because Luke and Ashton aren’t doing shit, and silently communicate with Calum. Just like he always does. 

He supposes he should be a little more concerned considering this is their last practice before their show, but since the last pep talk with Luke and Ashton, things seem to be running much smoother than they were last week. At least Luke and Ashton are playing their notes correctly. For the most part. But Michael’s not going to ignore the fact that he catches them sneaking wistful glances at each other when they think no one else is watching. He sees. He knows. 

So now they’re kind of just at this standstill, with the knowledge of what both of them think of the situation at hand, but no one is fucking doing anything.

Michael admits he takes a little bit of the blame in that, since he isn’t really doing shit to try and further or improve their relationship either. But in his defense, he doesn’t want to meddle in a things that he shouldn't meddle in because he’s not a pissbaby.

Feldman isn’t watching him. Michael quickly whips out his phone to text Luke.

**to: #1 dumbass [2:36 PM]**

> _ you should talk to ashton _

**from: #1 dumbass [2:38 PM]**

> _ Lmao _

**to: #1 dumbass [2:38 PM]**

> _ you really should this whole thing is just a big complication _

**from: #1 dumbass [2:38 PM]**

> _ Listen man no way _

Michael sighs and doesn’t reply. He’ll try a different approach. Ashton.

**to: #2 dumbass [2:41 PM]**

> _ you should talk to luke  _

**from: #2 dumbass [2:42 PM]**

> _ Why? _

**to: #2 dumbass [2:42 PM]**

> _ [jnsert steve harvey ‘you know why’ gif] _

**from: #2 dumbass [2:43 PM]**

> _ Why do you care? _

**to: #2 dumbass [2:43 PM]**

> _ you guys are my friends dumbass fix this  _

**from: #2 dumbass [2:43 PM]**

> _ You're so annoying sometimes _

**to: #2 dumbass [2:44 PM]**

> _ :) _

Michael hopes that his mildly unhelpful self will be able to finally get them to talk to each other. If they don’t make up, which Michael completely doubts because they’re both too sappy to do that, then at least they’ll actually interact without it being all sad and depressing.

Even though Michael knows that they’ll probably want their conversation to most likely be private, Michael really can’t help the fact that he’s an absolute snoop and will definitely try and figure out a way to listen in. He knows he shouldn’t, but hey, it’s better to know for himself than to get different summaries of the same conversation from Luke and Ashton. 

Feldmann says some measure number in the song that’s sitting on the stand in front of Michael that Michael isn't paying attention to. It takes Michael by surprise but he quickly figures out where everyone is in Whiplash and joins in effortlessly, and Feldmann doesn’t even notice. 

Jazz band ends at 4:00, and Michael has no idea if Ashton is going to talk to Luke today. He prays that he is, because they need to sort out their shit before the competition, and that’s in three days. 

It’s now that Michael actually starts paying attention to Calum, just because. He doesn’t know what to call his relationship with Calum anymore, because they went out on a technically-a-date but also a technically-not-a-date so Michael’s not really sure. He knows Calum likes him and he knows he likes Calum, and they’re at kind of a standstill just like Luke and Ashton. But this standstill is like a  _ too scared to initiate anything _ official whereas Luke and Ashton’s is like a  _ we fucked up now what _ standstill. 

So yeah, Calum is still beautiful, beautiful when the trombone is away from his lips and they’re red and puckered, beautiful when he stares at the clock like it’s going to make the time pass faster, beautiful when he’s waiting for Feldmann to stop focusing on a specific section that’s not his, beautiful always. And Michael is stupidly in like with him. And maybe Calum is stupidly in like with him back. 

This time, when Calum catches him staring, Michael doesn’t turn away. 

**;**

Jazz band ticks by much slower than it normally does, which makes no sense because it always starts and ends at the exact same time, but eventually it’s over and Feldmann is saying, “Two days left, practice!” and Michael doesn’t take his eyes off of Ashton the entire time he’s detaching his tenor sax from his neck strap and putting it in the case. 

A hand on his shoulder jolts him a little, and he jumps before turning around to find Calum leaning in close. 

“Talked to either of them yet?” Calum asks quietly, like he’s afraid to be heard, and Michael doesn’t know why he’s whispering when first off, Luke and Ashton are across the room, and second, it’s loud in the band room after practice. It always is.

“Yeah,” Michael says casually. He’s a little taken aback by the closeness of Calum’s body to his and how sudden it was, but he can deal. “I think Ashton’s going to talk to Luke.”

“Seriously? Fuck, when?” Calum asks, eyes widening as he hears the news. 

Michael shuts his saxophone case and carelessly stuffs his band folder into his backpack, looking up to see if he can find either Luke or Ashton. He does, easily too, and Ashton is approaching Luke and placing a gentle hand on his shoulder, just like Calum did to Michael. 

“Now?” Michael responds, looking at them. Calum looks at them too, sees how Luke turns around and seems to stop breathing when he comes face to face with Ashton. Michael catches Ashton discreetly pointing to one of the doors leading into the hallway of the school. Michael swears quickly and drags Calum with him out the door at the other end so they get into the hallway too. They scurry to hide behind a pillar before Luke and Ashton make it outside. 

It’s quite comforting to know that Calum is just as much of a meddling snoop as Michael is. 

Michael holds a finger to his lips, telling Calum that they both need to keep their damn mouths shut so Luke and Ashton don’t think anyone is listening to them. What they don’t know won’t hurt them.

Michael feels bad for listening in on their supposedly private conversation, he really does, he swears. 

“Luke,” Ashton says, and he says it like a whine, like a noise of helplessness. 

“Ash,” Luke says back, same tone of voice. “I’m sorry.”

“I didn’t mean to run out,” Ashton tells him. 

Calum’s getting closer to the edge of the corner and Michael’s not sure which way they’re facing so he grabs Calum by the neck of his shirt and pulls him back, shooting him a look of  _ what the fuck are you doing?  _

“I was scared,” Ashton continues, and hopefully neither of them have seen Calum or Michael. “It was so much.”

“I know,” Luke says, and Michael knows Luke’s different tones of voice and this one sounds like he just keeps on piling the self-blame. “I-I didn’t mean to, if you don’t - I don’t - I didn’t think you would kiss back.”

Ashton laughs a little, probably trying to break the tension. “I didn’t either.”

Luke doesn’t respond. Probably more self-blame. 

“I’m glad I did,” Ashton continues. Luke keeps quiet. 

Michael’s wondering if they’ll kiss again. He wouldn’t mind it; it would really complete the whole make-up scene. It sounds like they’re about to anyway, what with Luke silent snd Ashton just finished talking. 

“Me too,” Luke says, almost silently enough that even Michael has to lean forward a bit to hear him. 

It’s a shitty time for Calum to take over, because they accidentally round the corner to find, sure enough, Luke and Ashton fixed in a soft kiss. Michael almost pulls Calum back but Luke catches them and he parts with Ashton.

“What were you guys doing?” he asks, innocently at first but Michael feels like Luke suspects something. 

He shoots Calum a look that says something along the lines of ‘let me handle this’ before speaking. “In the auditorium, I thought I dropped some money there but I couldn’t find it.”

He says it smoothly and calmly, like it really was what they were doing. Luke seems to believe it. 

“Did we miss something?” Calum asks obliviously. There’s a grin on his face, though.

“Nothing too major,” Ashton smiles warmly at the two of them before turning back to Luke with what Michael pinpoints as appreciation.

“Just a couple of bros,” Luke says jokingly, earning a laugh from Ashton in response. Michael rolls his eyes, he  _ so _ expected this. So expected them to immediately jump into the ‘cheesy and domestic gay couple’ after making up. Michael pretends to vomit, but he knows that he only just seems fond. He is.

**;**

With two days left, the saxophone is all that Michael is thinking about. Especially since Luke and Ashton are officially boyfriends and spend all their time feeding each other or making out. It’s one less worry for Michael. They have no more practices left before the performance, and at this point, Michael knows the music so well that he could probably play it blindfolded and backwards. 

Neither Calum nor Michael have made any sort of move since their not-a-date date. Michael doesn’t know if they ever will. 

**;**

A single day left and Michael calls for a final get together at the music store just to practice before the show. He thinks it’ll be be beneficial but really, it’s still the stress talking and Michael needs to calm the fuck down. 

So his intent at the music store is really not to practice, but just to stop jittering about. 

He arrives first and says hi to Jared before pulling out his tenor sax and setting it up. Michael plays a couple of scales and he seems to have gained a hold of himself, calming down as he melts into the sound of the saxophone. 

That’s when Calum walks through the door and just completely fucking obliterates all of his bravado, because Calum is sweaty and beautiful and the trombone he’s carrying just makes his bicep bulge right through his shirt. 

Michael never fails to forget just how good Calum can look, and he’s always blown away. For the third time, Michael accidentally stumbles into a shelf, knocking off some reeds and neck straps. Fuck.

He supposes the whole friend thing has also died down, because Michael really likes Calum and he thinks he likes him even more now with the knowledge that Calum likes him back. 

Not that either of them are doing anything about that fact, but anyway. It’s good to know. 

“Hi,” Calum says casually, like he didn’t just clear Michael right off his feet. 

“Hi,” Michael says back. 

“Are you the only one here yet?”

“Yeah, Luke and Ash are probably off somewhere eating each other’s faces,” Michael jokes, even though it’s probably the truth. 

“Yeah,” Calum says back, chuckling, but it seems forced. Like Calum’s not sure what to say to Michael anymore. 

Oh no, they’re making a slow progression into Luke and Ashton pre-make up. They’re getting distant because they’re at a standstill and their conversations don’t hold nearly as much depth as they used to. They’re drifting. They’ll get to a point where it’ll be too hard for either of them to make a move because they’re too scared. 

Now isn’t the time though, because Michael spies out of his little eye Luke and Ashton walking towards the door, hands interlaced as Luke rests his head on Ashton’s shoulder. Michael can’t imagine how comfortable that must be. 

They walk in and immediately Calum spits out some joke about them being lovebirds but they just smile fondly at each other and get ready. 

“Something changed?” Jared asks when he sees them, eyebrows raised and a smirk on his face. 

“Oh, nothing much,” Luke responds, laughing. 

“I’ll leave you guys to your practice, break anything and you pay for it,” Jared says, walking off to the back hallway. What he’s reminding them of is the time where Ashton accidentally managed to snap one of the drumsticks he was borrowing in the middle of a practice, trying to hide it in a guitar box. It didn’t work out. 

The entire practice Michael spends looking at Calum. Except the times when he knows Calum is looking at him. 

**;**

Michael hates dress shirts. Granted, he hates all shirts that aren’t t-shirts, but he especially hates dress shirts and ties. He  _ hates _ ties. These ties are specifically the worst, though, because is there really anything worse than fluorescent orange?

It’s alright though, because the rest of his outfit is black, so you win some, you lose some. 

He shows up at the band room four minutes late with his tenor sax in hand, to find that Luke is the only one out of their little group that’s there. Which makes Michael feel better, because he thought he’d miss the bus. 

He runs out to put his saxophone on the bus and sees Ashton walking over, carrying a bag that no doubt has his drumsticks and music in it. 

“Hey, Mike,” Ashton says and Michael nods in return, hands occupied with a tenor sax. “Think you could help me with the drum kit?”

“Why don’t you ask your boyfriend?” Michael taunts back as he places his tenor sax on one of the bus seats. “He’s inside.”

“Fuck, already?” Ashton swears. He doesn’t say anything else, instead scurrying inside. Michael quickly follows Ashton into the building to find him embracing the younger boy below him, and Michael wishes he stayed outside. 

“Blech,” Michael says smiling as he approaches them, watching them part and turn to face him. “You guys are too sweet, it’s disgusting.”

“What’s disgusting?” 

It’s Calum who says that, causing Michael to turn around and see the boy, all dressed up and ready to go. He’s never looked so good. 

(Actually, that’s a lie. Calum always looks good.)

“They are,” Michael says, walking over with his hand pointing to Luke and Ashton. He sighs and stands next to Calum, resting his head on the younger boy’s shoulder. He’s not sure if he’s overstepped any boundaries they may have set when he does, but he has no time to worry about it because sure enough, Luke is already swooping in with a “Blech” of his own, earning the finger from Michael. 

They spend the next ten minutes fooling around and filming each other doing dumb things with the instruments and materials they have in front of each other as everyone arrives. 

It’s fun, Michael thinks as he films his friends doing some stupid thing with the big bass drum in the back of the room, he loves watching them. Loves that this is all so natural and that these are his best friends and he’s not sure what he’d do without them. 

Eventually, Feldmann calls for them to all get on the bus because they’re already five minutes late, and they all pile on. Michael, Luke, Calum, and Ashton all decide to occupy the seats at the very back. Michael jokes that it’s because Luke and Ashton want to make out in private, but he really isn’t joking. 

About halfway through the bus ride Luke and Ashton  _ do _ start kissing and getting all lovey-dovey (after some ridiculous screaming that Michael doesn’t know the reason for), and Michael and Calum both decide to start filming them. Good blackmail material for later, even though it’s dark outside and also Luke and Ashton would literally never be ashamed of their relationship. 

It’s not the sloppy kissing either, just them being two bros that just happened to start dating with no other backstory. They’re not swallowing down each other’s tongues -- though Michael wishes he could say he’s never seen them do that either -- and they’re just being boyfriends. 

They reach the little place where they’re performing and everyone helps with setting up the mics and the drum kit. It’s not a large crowd, Michael’s already sneaked a peak and there aren’t as many people, not as many as there have been in past shows. To be fair, it’s still pretty damn early in the season, earlier than the other years where they wouldn’t start a show until after winter break was over. 

Michael’s looking forward to it though, looking forward to actually playing for real instead of rehearsing in their little music store or the band room. 

After they’ve warmed up and they’re all good to go they march out onto the platform they’ll be performing on. Michael sends a warm look to Calum and he returns the favor. 

Michael’s forgotten how much fun it is to perform in front of people until Feldmann starts The Jazz Police and he’s instantly reminded. He loves his tenor sax, loves hearing the music that comes out of it and being able to quickly move his fingers along the instrument. Loves the sounds everyone else in the band is making, loves that this is all  _ them _ , no backups.

In fact, the rush of exhilaration he gets from his measly, mildly unrehearsed solo during the solo section of the song stays with him for the rest of the entire performance, which is only three songs; it’s not that many. 

But no matter, because mistake or not, the minute they finish and they’re out of sight Michael is so pumped up his just grabs Calum without warning, pulling him in for a tight but quick kiss before he’s off again, unaware of what he just did. 

It’s thirty seconds later when the whole thing finally resonates with him. That he just kissed Calum. And that Calum didn’t seem to object. It’s the first move either of them have made in days, and Michael’s not sure if he’s comfortable with that. 

He doesn’t talk with Calum for the rest of the time they spend at the plae. He’s too scared he’s not going to react the way Michael wants him to. He refuses to do what Luke did though, to stop talking to him completely and think that things will just solve themselves that way. They won’t. 

So, when they’re in the privacy of the bus ride home, the only things illuminating their faces are the street lights, they talk. 

“Did you mean it?” Calum asks first. He’s probably thought about this long and hard too. 

“I’d like to think so,” Michael responds. “Do you want me to mean it?”

“I’d like to think so,” Calum says back. “This was a whole lot easier than Luke and Ashton’s problem.”

“Yeah, ‘cause we’re not afraid to talk to each other,” Michael jokes back. 

When Michael subconsciously connects his hand with Calum as they sit in the dark and Calum doesn’t flinch, Michael thinks he could get used to this. And when Calum sneaks a kiss on Michael’s cheek, Michael  _ knows _ he could get used to this. In fact, maybe he already has.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> u know where 2 catch me ([my tumblr](http://drcpdead.tumblr.com))


	10. epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> holy shit !!! i finished it !! it's the beginning of the end!!!! oh my god!!!!! ok look i know that if you waited for this you waited for like over a month and i have no excuse for that but it's done !!! i am so proud of this fic (the first fic i ever finished!) and i'm very pleased with myself, enjoy!
> 
> (this is unedited i got so excited i finished it im posting it without editing)

Michael’s decided that he really hates junior prom season. It’s too much pressure, he decides as he’s strolling around the mall with his hands in his pockets. He doesn’t even know why he’s at the mall. He told his mom he was out to look for a job but five minutes after he arrived he plugged in his earphones and hasn’t taken them out since.

He’s already got a tux, too. It’s a little big and the pant legs are kind of short, but he has some super cool socks that he wants to wear, so it’s actually a bonus. Besides, no one is going to look at his ankles at prom. No one.

Prom season is just absolutely terrifying, Michael thinks. There’s this ridiculous expectation of an extravagant promposal, but Michael swears he’s never even heard of that word until a couple weeks ago, when people started asking their significant others out. He also hopes Calum didn’t expect one from him, because his offer to take Calum to the dance was a simple “Wanna go to prom?” and then a celebratory pizza.

On the other hand, however, because Ashton is a senior, he definitely went all out, and he totally got Michael and Calum to help him go through with his idea. Ashton’s idea of a promposal included writing a letter at a time on pieces of paper and sticking them around on music stands in the band room while he sat confidently at the drum set. He recruited Calum and Michael to drag Luke to the band room with some dumb fucking excuse Calum came up when they were halfway there.

Once there, Luke was presented with letters scattered around the room and a beaming Ashton with some goddamn flowers. Luke and Ashton went home with each other after an unnecessarily long kiss.  

Michael hates saps, he thinks, passing by a shoe store.

**;**

It’s junior prom day. Luke’s not going, opting out to spend the night with Ashton doing things Michael doesn’t want to think about rather than third-wheeling his two, not-that-affectionate-yet-still-dating friends.

Because junior prom is basically a rip off of senior prom, the school has decided for it to be on a Friday rather than a Saturday, but Michael really has no clue what the difference is.

At least school’s a distraction, because Michael wouldn’t know what to do with himself if it was on a Saturday, leaving him with all this free time to do absolutely nothing. Which is really fucking boring, so.

But even the teachers seem to be going light on the homework, knowing that literally no one is going to do it over the weekend. Michael doesn’t do his homework on a regular basis, and usually snatches the answers from Calum or Luke, who are both well-behaved, responsible students with the majority of their life in order. Michael envies it, but he also knows Luke gets approximately four hours of sleep a night, and while grades matter to Luke, sleep matters about as much to Michael.

Everyone in the entire school is buzzing about tonight, except for maybe the freshmen, who don’t care. Michael wishes he had that mindset. Freshman year sucked ass, but it was a lot less stressful than any other years Michael’s ever had, so he misses it.

The schedules have changed up since it’s the spring semester, so Michael doesn’t get to see Calum as much as he used to. He only sees him during band, where Michael finds the most relief, and lunch. Michael’s usually kind of annoyed about this; he really likes Calum’s company, but today he’s actually kind of thankful. He doesn’t know what Calum wants to talk about on junior prom day. Does he want to talk about prom? Or avoid the subject? Does he even care a lot about junior prom? Michael knows that neither of them really want to dedicate themselves to the concept, but they’re willing and glad to go.

Michael’s even a little skittish during lunch, bouncing around the topic without bringing it up. There’s a table in front of them filled with couples, all bubbling about tonight. Michael doesn’t know what to think anymore.

“What are you two going to do while we’re out?” Calum asks, stuffing an entire chicken nugget into his mouth at once.

Luke smiles smugly at Calum before leaning his head in the crook of Ashton’s neck.

“You guys are fucking disgusting,” Michael says, frowning. “They probably won’t even do anything, just watch sappy movies and throw popcorn into each others’ mouths.”

“Are we that predictable, Mike?” Luke gasps, fake incredulously.

“Yes,” Michael nods back.

Luke laughs and nuzzles Ashton’s nose. Michael swears he almost throws up, but he’s gotten used to the feeling, since Luke and Ashton are literally That Couple You Read About In A Happy Gay Book. They’re them and Michael knows.

But it’s so like them to be like this, to go out on movie dates and fancy dates and kiss each other all the time and send each other good morning and goodnight texts. Michael can see them in college, still the exact same as they are now only a little older and a little wiser. And he can see them in ten years time, engaged, with a shiny ring on Luke’s fourth finger and an apartment filled with soft colors and grocery bags on the counter.

It’s amazing and also unbelievably cliche, how they’ve already seemed to find their one and only, and they haven’t even graduated yet.

Michael still hates saps.

**;**

When school ends, Michael still has no idea what he’s supposed to do until seven o’clock. He could go over to Calum’s place, except he’s not really sure why he doesn’t want to.

Actually, wait, _yes_ , he has a reason. It’s Mali, Calum’s wonderful but a little _too_ personal sister, and he knows that if he steps his foot into their house he will probably be spending more time dodging Mali’s good-hearted but annoying questions than talking to Calum. She’s great, and Michael wishes he had a sister like her, but he doesn’t feel like talking about prom for four hours straight.

Michael makes the unsurprising decision to head over to Luke’s instead. He knows Ashton will be there too, and maybe it’s a little rude to leave Calum out of the fun, but Michael needs to convince Luke to let him borrow his car for the night.

Michael’s a shitty driver, too, but he’ll drive fifteen under the speed limit if it means Luke’s car’s safety without a scratch by the end of the night, or at least, tomorrow morning. Luke loves his car almost as much as he loves Ashton.

Michael arrives and Luke is anything but shocked, simply opening the door without a single word except for, “Ashton’s here too,” and Michael can’t say he’s surprised.

He immediately heads for Luke’s basement, the center of kind-of-gross teenage boy world. Ashton’s downstairs already and he isn’t playing ping pong, no, he’s lying on top of the table, pretending to smoke a rolled chocolate wafer because that’s what Ashton does.

“Hey babe,” Luke says as he walks closer to him, and Michael rolls his eyes so hard he feels like they might fall out of his eye sockets. Luke is such a nickname kind of guy, and while it’s kind of endearing, it’s also definitely Not Creepy.

(It’s creepy--the next time Luke calls Michael anything other than Michael or some variation of that it’ll be the end of him.)

“Hey babe,” Ashton responds in almost the exact same tone. Michael doesn’t know what to do, and now he gets why Luke is sitting out on junior prom, because this is exactly how he’s going to feel. Except maybe not, because the only thing that’s changed between Michael and Calum now that they’re dating is just that. They’re dating.

“Ashton, get off the damn table. Also, hand me one of those,” Michael says, sighing, as he motions towards the tin of rolled wafers right next to Ashton.

Ashton pulls one out and tosses it to Michael, but Michael, having the hand-eye coordination of a baby walrus, doesn’t even get near it (he’ll blame Ashton later for a shitty throw, but Michael knows Ashton knew what he was doing and Michael just doesn’t Sport) and it breaks when it drops to the carpet.

“Good job,” Luke snorts, and Michael shoots up the middle finger as he picks up the pieces and, expectedly, eats them anyway.

“How many of those do you think you could fit in your mouth?” Michael says, getting an idea and he feels like this what Darwin feels like when he discovered evolution.

“Let’s find out,” Ashton says excitedly, jumping off the ping pong table with his arm wrapped around the tin. He goes up to Luke and starts rapidly stuffing them into his mouth one by one, until his mouth is so goddamn stretched out it looks like it’s made of rubber or something.

“This is what Luke looks like sucking your dick!” Michael shouts as they’re doing so, and Luke almost chokes at the comment, for real.

He spits out the collection of rolled wafers that have gathered into his mouth onto the floor and starts coughing, Ashton rubbing his back the entire time.

“Did you just compliment my boyfriend’s penis?” Luke asks between breathy hacks.

Michael thinks about what he literally just said for a second, before shrugging. “Guess so. Don’t sweat it, Hemmings. Calum’s more than enough for me.”

“Are you hinting that you know what Calum’s dick looks like?” Ashton asks.

“Can we stop talking about dick for like, just a sec? There’s a pile of wafer vomit on the floor.”

“Leave it, I’ll get some shit to mark that we shouldn’t step in it later,” Luke says, waving his hand around carelessly. “Wanna play some ping pong?”

Michael gladly grabs a paddle, even though he’s literally always been the Number One Worst at ping pong, again, due to his lack of hand-eye coordination. He just wants the time to pass until he has to put on his tux and drive to Calum’s. Which reminds him, he still needs to ask Luke if he can borrow his car.

“Hey, Luke,” Michael asks as Luke scores another point against him with Ashton as his personal cheerleader in the background.

“What?”

“Can I borrow your--”

“No way man, you’re a shitty driver,” Luke immediately responds without even letting Michael finish his question.

“What the fuck--” Michael begins as he manages to pass the ball back to Luke’s side without thinking about it too much, “--I didn’t even finish my question.”

“I know, but I know what’s you’re going to say and the answer is no,” Luke says, effortlessly passing the ball over the net and out of Michael’s reach.

( _It’s no fair_ , Michael thinks. Luke has 24 hour access to the damn ping pong table).

“Come on, what am I supposed to do, escort Calum on a fucking scooter?” Michael asks, sighing as he picks up the ball and serves it back to Luke.

“Get creative!” Luke says, hitting the ball. “Bring him in a shopping cart!”

“I am not pushing Calum two miles from a store to the school in a shopping cart!” Michael exclaims. “I can barely play ping pong!” He misses the ball completely and doesn’t even complain. “See? Point proven.”

“Just let him, babe,” Ashton says, resting a hand on Luke’s wide shoulder. Michael is smiling to himself now; he knows Luke is going to melt under Ashton’s touch and now Michael gets to borrow his car.

“Alright, fine, Clifford. But if I see a single thing out of place I am replacing your shampoo with my piss,” Luke warns. “No prom sex, either.”

Michael almost cackles.

“Why, is the backseat reserved for just you and Ashton?” Michael retorts back, causing a furious blush to form on Luke’s cheeks as he looks down to the ground. Ashton is smiling and has his large arm wrapped around Luke’s torso.

_Saps_ , Michael thinks.

**;**

Michael feels weird, standing in front of Calum’s door in a rented tuxedo with a discolored rose in his hand. He requested for the stalk to be thorn-less, but apparently, it didn’t go through, and Michael received a nasty surprise when he picked up the rose.

A bandaid and some complaining later, Michael’s on Calum’s front step and he’s trying not to freak out and turn away. He hasn’t even rung the doorbell yet.

Michael takes some deep breaths and presses the doorbell, shaking off his nerves and trying to smile as best as he can.

Mali opens the door, and Michael can’t say he’s surprised.

“Hi Michael!” she exclaims, her face beaming with joy. “You look very nice, Calum probably can’t wait to see you,” she compliments, and Michael doesn’t even have time to say thank you before Mali is turning her head over her shoulder and screaming Calum’s name up the stairs.

“He’s taking forever--probably worried about his hair,” Mali sighs, but she’s still smiling and Michael wonders if her cheeks ever hurt from being such a positive, delightful person all the time.

She screams his name again and Michael is definitely feeling a little more anxious as the seconds pass.

Contrary to popular belief (the media) Michael is not swept off his feet when Calum walks elegantly down the stairs like a god. In fact, Calum doesn’t even walk elegantly down the stairs. He’s still fiddling with his left sleeve and he’s going a little too fast and not looking where he’s going and almost trips on the last step and if Calum saw his hair he’d think it was a disaster but Michael thinks it’s perfect.

“Hey, you good?” Michael asks when Calum joins him.

(Calum looks fucking amazing in a suit.)

“Now I am,” Calum says, nodding. “Wow, this is the most cleaned up I’ve seen you since the band concert in March,” he comments, looking Michael up and down.

“Shut up,” Michael pouts, lightly shoving Calum away from him.

“Look at you guys, practically married already,” Mali beams, obviously proud. She shuffles a hand through Calum’s hair, fixing it slightly and while Michael is a little disappointed, Calum looks good with any hairstyle so he can’t really complain.

“Just take the photos, Mali,” Calum sighs.

Mali’s got her pastel pink polaroid camera in her hand and arranges herself to get the perfect shot of Calum and Michael in front of the door. She counts down and snaps the picture of the two of them.

“Nice,” she says as the photo comes out of the camera. She waves it around for a couple seconds before setting it down on the table. “One more?”

“Not really, we wanna go,” Calum says, turning around to face the door but Michael’s mind gets the better of him and he stops Calum, saying that he wouldn’t mind if he had another photo.

In this one, Michael is being held in Calum’s arms, almost bridal style. He knows he catches Calum off guard when he jumps, and Mali catches the moment perfectly.

She hands the photo to Michael once it’s come into focus, and smiles. Michael doesn’t even need to look at the photo to know it’s exactly what he had in mind.

They both walk outside and Calum immediately chuckles when he sees Luke’s car parked out front.

“Seriously?”

“It’s this or a shopping cart, Hood. Don’t push it,” Michael warns as he opens the door for Calum like a gentleman should (Calum rolls his eyes when he does, and lightly punches Michael as he gets into the passenger seat).

“If I die in your hands tonight, just know that my last thought was probably of you. Or my trombone,” Calum says.

“Everyone keeps telling me I’m a shitty driver, I get it, I’m not the _best_ , but I’m trying to be romantic here, so leave me alone,” Michael sighs, starting the engine and driving off.

They jam out to some hardcore rock while driving. Anything but sappy.

**;**

The dance is, Michael will call it, a little underwhelming. He didn’t expect it to be this big hyped up thing anyway, it’s only junior prom, but it’s still, in Michael’s best words, _eh_.

It doesn’t matter. They walk in and the DJ’s playing Britney Spears and Michael thinks life is pretty good when he and Calum start awkwardly side-stepping. He wonders if anyone’s put alcohol in the punch yet.

The dance isn’t really that magical. By the end of the night, Michael’s discovered that Calum is shitty at most types of dance and Michael is shitty at _all_ types of dance, so maybe proms aren’t their thing. But they had a good time and Calum has a shit ton of selfies of the two of them in the dark, illuminated only by the flashing spotlights and their glow stick necklaces. If Calum doesn’t send them to Michael, he’ll make sure to steal Calum’s phone and send them to himself.

What _is_ weird is the fact that Calum’s crowned prom king, which is something neither of them actually expected. When they said his name, Calum looked like he’d forgotten he’d even been nominated.

Calum doesn’t dance with the girl crowned queen and instead they share a platonic high five before going off to their respective dates.

“Look at you, prince,” Michael had said when Calum walked over with a slightly lopsided crown covering his beautifully messy hair.

“That’s _King_ to you, peasant,” Calum says back, laughing.

“You love me,” Michael teases.

“Yeah, I know,” Calum says back.

It’s weird, Michael realizes to himself. Looking at Calum in the dark, only lit up by the random neon dance lights and his fading glow stick, with a reflective, plastic crown on his head, Michael sees him and looking into Calum’s eyes, he can see his future.

Michael thinks it might be a _little_ sappy when Michael takes off Calum’s crown (he’d much rather see the boy’s hair) with a fond smile on his face as he pecks Calum’s cheek.

**;**

As promised, there is no after-prom sex in Luke’s car. Michael and Calum jam out to _blink-182_ in the car ride home, and Calum is having tons of fun pretending his crown is a guitar.

“Tonight was fun,” Michael says, smiling.

“Yeah,” Calum agrees.

That’s the first time they’ve spoken to each other since they got in the car. Michael had wordlessly put in his blink CD and they began air-guitarring to the songs, but they haven’t actually said anything to each other. Michael doesn’t know what to say, really. Does he talk about prom, which just happens? Does he drop the subject and bring up something else, like the upcoming AP exams (ew, he doesn’t want to think about those, gross)? What else?

“Wanna come home with me?” Calum asks out of the blue, even though he is not the one driving and also not the escort _ee_ , but the escort _ed_.

Michael responds without thinking about it for another second.

_Luke won’t miss his car_ , Michael thinks as he turns onto Calum’s street.

It’s way past eleven when they arrive at Calum’s house. Michael’s not sure if Mali’s awake or asleep, but he knows her well enough to not ask questions if the two of them walk in together.

There’s no giggling and making out and running romantically up the stairs, laughing and holding hands. Michael almost breaks the doorknob off the door and actually crashes into the fridge (which, Michael has no idea how he did that, considering the fridge has lights on the outside for the water dispenser).

Calum leads him upstairs and the closer Michael gets to Calum’s room, the more prominent the idea of them actually having sex becomes.

Michael doesn’t know what gay sex is like, if he’ll be honest. He knows it’s up the ass but he doesn’t really know anything else, and he also has no idea if he’s a top or a bottom. He just has no fucking clue, really.

“Thank God Mali’s asleep or I’d never hear the end of this,” Calum comments as they pass her room. There’s no light coming from under the closed door.

“Are we actually doing this?” Michael asks, even though he just meant to think that in his head.

“I think so? Do you want to?” Calum asks back, framing his words like questions because it looks like he’s totally unsure too.

Michael is about to nod when he realizes it’s dark and Calum can’t see his head move when he can’t really see anything.

“Do you?”

Maybe the amount of questions is a bit excessive, but Michael really wants to make sure they both want to do this. Also, Michael definitely has no idea what he’s doing.

“Well, yeah,” Calum says.

“Then I do, too,” Michael says back and he feels as confident as Calum does right now. They walk into his room.

Calum’s room is larger than Michael’s but equally as messy, and Michael can feel himself stepping on clothes rather than carpet. He took off his tux jacket in the car, thinking it’s just Too Much now that they’re not at prom anymore.

What do they do now? Do they undress themselves? Do they undress each other? Do they kiss? They should probably kiss, if they’re going to have sex, but this whole thing is really new and Michael is clueless.

Calum starts taking off his shoes and socks so Michael assumes he should do the same, and just follows Calum’s lead in the whole clothes removal process. They do not undress each other at all sexually, just get out of their clothes like they would if no one was watching them.

Seeing Calum shirtless reminds him of the first time he ever saw him, in a tight sweat-drenched shirt that clung to his body. Except this is ten times better than that.

“You look good naked,” Michael says to Calum, easing the tension.

“Thanks bro, you do too,” Calum says back once Michael is completely nude. “What now?”

“Got condoms?” Michael asks and Calum starts looking around his room. Michael thinks that was the right thing to say.

“Ah! Found them,” Calum says, pulling out a box (and some lube) and ripping one out of a pack. “Who’s gonna be the one with the dick up their ass?”

Michael doesn’t think Calum could have phrased that any more inappropriately for the situation. Calum sighs and just rips open the condom himself.

“You okay with that?” Calum asks him.

Michael shrugs. “Yeah.”

The next few minutes that follow are too awkward for Michael to even think about properly without wanting to curl into a ball, but he’s decided Calum is beautiful and kissable and even though neither of them know what they’re doing it’s actually the best way Michael could be spending his night.

The sensation is weird but not necessarily uncomfortable, not with the amount of lube in between them. Michael doesn’t know why this is supposed to be the most meaningful thing anyone can ever do with someone else, but he doesn’t mind it. Not with Calum.

There’s no light in the room; it’s dark and they can only feel each other’s heavy breaths and hear each other’s pants. _Sex is strange_ , Michael thinks. He’s not sure if he is 100% for it, but whatever. Calum’s gorgeous and there’s no one else he’d rather be doing this with.

They both come pretty damn quickly, Michael would say they had a good five-ten minute run before it was over, but it was still nice. Michael laughs when Calum throws the condom in the trash and is complaining about how gross it is while doing so.

Michael falls asleep next to Calum that night. His body is warm and it feels like it’s home, more than anything else. He’s not a heavy sleeper nor is he the fastest at falling asleep, but everything about Calum is comforting and Michael knows he’ll sleep beautifully tonight.

They don’t say any more words, but Michael knows that when Calum thinks he’s asleep, he hears three words whispered into his ear.

Michael hates to admit it, but he’s such a fucking sap.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok quick couple shoutouts: 
> 
> **mar:** thank u so much for supporting me through this fic and making it easier for me to write and just encouraging it and being the overall #1 stan thank u
> 
> **genememe:** u! u nerd u..... u big nerd wow thank u to you too i love u and im so glad u liked this #tromboner
> 
> **my tumblr followers:** i know i switched to kpop now but most of you have stuck around and i really appreciate that wow!! thank u for loving this fic it means a lot
> 
> **malum stans:** SHOUTOUT
> 
> alright thats it thanks folks i love u!!!!!


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